SMEpost

Riding on uptick in crude oil prices, India devising game plan for Russia: EEPC INDIA

In a bid to take advantage of the turnaround in the crude oil prices and its positive impact on the oil producers, the EEPC India is working on a game plan in partnership with the Commerce Ministry to reverse a huge fall of about 50 per cent in India’s engineering exports to Russia in 2015-16.

As a part of this strategy, the EEPC India and the India Brand Equity Foundation (IBEF) would be spear-heading a strong  delegation to   ‘INNOPROM’ with India  being a Partner Country in the flagship Russian engineering and technology event at   Ekaterinburg between July 11 and 14 , 2016. The international industrial fair which will host 600 companies from 70 countries will be organised in the Sverdlovsk region  located at the strategic Euroasian border.

Indian engineering exports which were USD 744 million  in 2014-15 dropped to USD 355 million  (for April-February) under the impact of a hit taken by the Russian e5conomy because of the fall in the crude oil prices. The Russian economy is heavily dependent on export of crude oil.

“With a turnaround in the oil prices, the Russian economy is bound to pick up this year and India would like to take advantage of the same. We need to be pretty aggressive in pushing our best foot forward,” EEPC India Chairman  T S Bhasin said.

He said besides the bilateral merchandise trade, the Indian efforts would be to attract Russian investment into manufacturing under the ‘Make in India’ flagship programme of the government that is aimed at improving an overall eco system for the industrial enterprises , both from within the country and outside.

In the previous edition of the ‘INNOPROM’ , the Partner Country status had gone to China while India being the fastest growing economy of the world would showcase its investment potential and trade possibilities.

The two countries which have a bilateral trade of about USD five billion have set an ambitious target of increasing it five-fold to USD 30 billion by 2025.