In a directive to Indian ambassadors abroad, the Narendra Modi government has asked them to invite not just the big companies to invest and ‘Make in India’, but also try and streamline investments for even the smaller and the smallest of all.

Indian ambassador to Italy Anil Wadhwa told  that it was his aim to attract niche areas of investment and technology from that country to India and to increase the volume of bilateral trade between the two countries by creating awareness in Italy about the opportunities of expanding business with India.

The Indian envoy has been in discussions with top Italian companies, including Imaginalis & El En group from the biomedical sector, ISE from engineering, and Mariplast from the fashion industry. According to Wadhwa, industrial cities of north Italy like Padova (strong in engineering, textiles, food, furniture), Verona (gems, jewellery, textiles, engineering), Bergamo (textiles, food processing, auto-components, chemicals, plastics, construction), Milan (fashion, engineering, green technology, financial service) and of south Italy like Rome (aero-space, pharmaceuticals, engineering) and Naples (leather, textiles, aero-space, engineering) are being tapped by the Indian mission there to encourage companies to participate in the PM’s ‘Make in India’ initiative.

Rajiva Sinha, secretary, MSME & textiles of West Bengal, recently visited  Verona, Florence and Naples with a high-level business delegation and spoke to Italian companies on the opportunities available in sectors of leather, textiles, gems & jewellery, engineering, waste management in West Bengal and invited them for technical collaboration, joint venture & investment in industrial clusters of West Bengal.

The delegation met about 50 companies at Naples and some of the Italian firms showed keen interest in investment in West Bengal.

Source: The Financial Express