India keen to partner with African countries for buying minerals

New Delhi, Aug 9 (ANI): Union Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma on Tuesday said India is keen to partner with Africa countries not only for buying minerals, but also providing technology for mining and exploration and value addition with long-term buy-back commitments.

Addresses the launch of Africa manual 2011- opportunities unlimited", here, Sharma said: "India is also committed to work with our partners in Africa for addressing the infrastructure deficit. India's infrastructure investments in Africa are in the range of 500 million dollars annually in the last decade."

Sharma also said: "We are engaged in a dialogue with SACU for concluding a preferential trading agreement and I am confident that we shall be able to do so by December 2011."

"We have been given the mandate to start engagement with Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) and we will be initiating a dialogue with The Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) for exploring the possibility of free trade agreements with these countries," he added.

He also emphasized that, the bilateral trade has increased 15-fold within a decade from a level of barely three billion dollars in 2000 to 46 billion dollars in 2010.

"Government is determined to achieve a target of 70 billion dollars trade well before 2014. India is a 1.6 trillion economy dollars, home to one of the largest middle class in the world, which is projected to cross 500 million in the coming decade," he said

Emphasising that African continent has witnessed consistent growth in excess of five percent in the last few years, Sharma said: "Credible projections indicate African GDP to reach 2.6 trillion dollars within this decade."

"It has received foreign investment of nearly 60 billion dollars last year as against just US seven billion dollars in 2002," he added.

Highlighting the importance of agro economy, Sharma commented that, agriculture has remained a high priority for India and partnership with African agriculture sector is already beginning to take shape.

Over 80 Indian agricultural companies have invested over 2.5 billion dollars in Ethiopia, Kenya, Madagascar, Senegal and Mozambique. Another 70 companies have lined up investments for Africa. (ANI)