India-China CEOs forum aims to give boost to bilateral trade

The India-China CEOs forum is being set-up with the objectives of developing a roadmap for increased cooperation and mutually beneficial contacts and partnership between the two countries, according to a note released by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry.

The forum would also address issues pertaining to the promotion of trade and investments, encouraging business alliances and possibilities for collaboration between Indian and Chinese companies and development of synergies to explore business opportunities in third countries, it added.

It will also address opportunities in sectors of mutual interest such as power and renewable energy, IT and telecom, banking and financial services, pharmaceuticals and infrastructure.

The forum would have co-chairpersons from both the neighbouring countries and shall consist of 15 members from each side. Special invitees can also be included in the forum at the discretion of the co-chairs.

Ambani has been nominated to co-chair the forum from the Indian side.

Apart from Ambani, the other members who would be on the Indian side of the roundtable are Mahindra & Mahindra's Anand Mahindra, Suzlon's Tulsi Tanti, Essar Group's Prashant Ruia, Gautam Adani of Adani Group, TCS's N Chandrasekharan, Cipla's Yusuf Hamied, Ashok Leyland's R Seshasayee, Bharat Forge's Baba Kalyani and SBI's Pratip Chaudhuri.

The idea of an India-China CEOs' forum was formally mooted during the visit of Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao to India in December, 2010.

The forum is scheduled to meet annually, but the frequency of the interactions could be increased if a need is evinced by other side.

Each side would submit reports to their respective governments on identified issues that could be taken up for discussions in inter-governmental meetings.

Both countries expect their overall trade to amount to about USD 100 billion by 2015.
Last year, overall trade between the two countries touched USD 61.7 billion. It crossed USD 35 billion in the January-June period this year.

Anil Ambani-led Reliance Group firm Reliance Power last year entered into an USD 8.29 billion deal with Chinese power equipment-maker Shanghai Electric Corp for the supply of 36 coal-fuelled power plants, to be installed in India.

This year, another group entity, Reliance Communications, got a USD 1.33 billion loan facility from a consortium of Chinese banks and financial institutions that was underwritten by China Development Bank.