JOIN USIn a clever move which has implications for India, China has announced that the fifth edition of its three-day Sino-Arab Forum will be held in Tunis on May 29 to explore new avenues for diversifying Sino-Arab cooperation in healthcare, human resource development, education, environment, and media. China has also underlined its support for the small and medium enterprises sector in Tunisia in areas such as agriculture, energy and textiles, to enhance economic cooperation and expand its access to North Africa and Europe as well, Cao Jiachang, head of the department of West Asia and Africa in the Chinese ministry of commerce, told an Arab media delegation that returned from a week-long visit to China last week.
As for expanding the membership of the UN Security Council, the official said: “We think that reform should be done in the Security Council and the first step required is to increase the number of representation from the developing countries, especially from Africa. This reform should be done in a comprehensive consultation with others.” Through these manoeuvres, China hopes to carve out a bigger slice of the West Asia market as its exports to North America and Europe have been hit.
Two-pronged strategy
China’s two-pronged strategy is meant to consolidate its position on both economic and political fronts, according to its deputy foreign minister who spoke to the Qatari News Agency in Beijing on May 14. Indo-Arab relations also run on similar lines, but they are still oriented towards the West unlike China. Thus, Sino-Arab bilateral trade had reached $ 190 billion last year, projecting it to be the the Gulf Council Countries’ (GCC) most important economic partner by 2020. No mean achievement for a country that opened its account just seven years ago, when the figure was $36.4 billion.
On the other hand, Indo- Arab trade touched $120 billion in the past two years, besides the remittances from six million Indian expatriates in the Gulf. The UAE is India’s largest trading partner in the GCC with the bilateral trade standing at $ 67b.in 2010 followed by Saudi Arabia ($25b.), Kuwait ($ 9 b), Qatar ($4.6 b), Oman ($4.5b.) and Bahrain ($1.5 billion). Based on the statistics, one would have expected India to strengthen its economic presence in the Gulf, especially with Saudi Arabia, the largest economy. But that has not happened along the expected lines.
In fact, India’s failure to leverage its strength in IT, healthcare, education and other sectors has played to the advantage of China, US and several Eurasian countries. They had sent high-level education missions to Riyadh, where a major international exhibition on higher education took place last month. Instead, India participated in the Jeddah exhibition where it had targeted NRIs’ children wanting to pursue higher education back home.
It was a major setback for India, since 420 prestigious universities and institutions of higher education from 39 countries, besides 55 Saudi universities, highlighted opportunities in higher education for Saudi students or the scope for partnership in this sector. India skipped the event, but attended the ‘Friends of Yemen’ donors’ conference held in Riyadh on May 23. Interestingly, Pakistan was not invited to the conference.
It was a wrong move on India’s part to opt out of a major international road show, because on March 28 this year, a 40-member youth delegation from Saudi Arabia was in Bangalore on a perception-changing visit to this country. They were exposed to India’s software power at Infosys Ltd and some higher education institutes that spawn techies and business managers. The objective of the visit, organised by the Saudi ministry of foreign affairs, was to “start a dialogue between young people from both our countries and learn from each other's culture, viewpoints and experiences.”
The youth delegation visited the L M Welingkar Institute of Management Development and Research campus in the Electronics City where it interacted with the faculty members and also exchanged ideas with the business school students. Reputed international business magazine Forbes India ranked Welingkar Institute 10th among the top private B-schools and eighth in the international linkages in its ‘Best business school survey’ last year.
India will also help in setting up an ICT Centre of Excellence as well as institutes of higher education and technology in Saudi Arabia. Saudi students would be offered scholarships to pursue PG and doctorate-level studies in technical institutions in India under the bilateral co-operation programme, which will also see human resource development related to telecommunications. The only way to achieve such ambitious goals is to reinforce our presence at these mega shows with a bang. By maintaining a low profile, its international image has taken a hit vis-a-vis its competitors like China.