Indian corporates on fact finding mission

Competitive terms a must to attract best in oil rigging:

Hiran H. Senewiratne

Sri Lanka and India should offer globally competitive terms and conditions in oil exploration to attract the best in the world, Indian Minister for Commerce Jairam Ramesh told the Daily News Business.

"When India was exploring oil and petroleum resources in 1986 by the famous Reliance Group we offered globally attractive terms and conditions, which enabled India to be competitive in the area, Minister Ramesh told a media conference in Colombo," yesterday.

Ramesh is on a three day visit with a high powered Indian delegation. They held discussions with the Enterprise Development and Investment Promotion Minister Dr. Sarath Amunugama to expand economic co-operation, trade and investment in both countries.

"After 10 years India has become globally competitive in the oil and petroleum sector which has done many explorations successfully. Therefore, it is essential for Sri Lanka to be globally competitive when they begin exploration in the Mannar basin," he said.

Minister Ramesh said the Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA) will also come into play shortly after seven rounds of successful discussions which is likely to be signed by July 2008.

"India today is an extremely important trading partner of Sri Lanka accounting for some 10 per cent of Sri Lanka's exports and about 15 per cent of Sri Lanka's imports. Sri Lanka's importance in India's external trade sector is much smaller but contributes about three per cent of India's exports and about 0.6 of India's imports", the Minister said.

On the investment side India has moved up the rankings in Sri Lanka from number nine seven years ago to number three now. India invested US$ 250 million in Sri Lanka.

US$ 360 million foreign direct investments is in the pipe line and US$ two billion project is under discussion, he said. Sri Lanka's major investment predominantly from Brandix and MAS Holdings is quite commendable, he said.

Brandix Apparels is planning to invest around US$ 650 million over the next five to seven years while MAS is planning to invest around US$ 200 million in an apparel park in Nellore district in the Andra Predesh.

Ramesh also said India is very much interested in investing in sectors like education and IT, which are lucrative for them. Minister Amunugama said Sri Lanka could achieve the target of US$ one billion Foreign Direct Investments in 2008. Top Indian companies are interested in investing in Sri Lanka which will push the growth rate in Sri Lanka.

The business delegation present at the fact-finding mission was Quarto, Wardham Textiles, Aditya Birla Group, Arvind Mills, Reliance Industries, Mahindra and Mahindra, Indo Rama Synthetics L and T, IOC are some of them.