Massive Indian trade fair begins in Moscow
Monday, 17 February 2003, 20:30 IST
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MOSCOW: An impressive Indian trade fair, billed as the largest exhibition of the country in Russia, kicked off here Monday with 180 companies from various sectors displaying a variety of wares. Indian Minister of State for Commerce and Industry Rajiv Pratap Rudy and Russian Minister of Industry, Science and Technology Ilya Klebanov jointly inaugurated the event, which will continue for a week. The trade fair, spread over several halls of Moscow's largest exhibition ground at Krasno-Presnenskaya, showcases products and services that Indian public and private firms export to markets like the U.S., Japan and the European Union. On display from the industrial sector are automobiles, hardware, machinery, packaging materials, consumer durables, gems and jewellery, processed food, textiles and dyes. From the services sector there are software facilities, tourism, oil prospecting and refining, banking and financial services. The fair is aimed at creating new awareness about India's trade potential in Russia that was once India's main trade and economic partner. Indo-Russian annual trade turnover nose-dived from $5.5 billion in 1991 to barely $1 billion in 1992 and has been hovering at around $1.5 billion -- much bellow the trade potential -- for the most part of the last decade. Traditional agricultural goods like tea, coffee, tobacco and soya account for about 40 percent of India's exports to Russia and their exports have displayed a sharp decline over the past two years, says professor Oleg Molyarov, an expert on the Indian economy in Moscow's prestigious Institute of Oriental Studies. And around 75 percent of Indian exports to Russia are rooted through debt- repayment rupee funds that are depleting fast and will be exhausted by 2005. This is likely to create a balance of trade problem for India unless urgent steps are taken to ensure the smooth transition to hard currency based trade, said Molyarov, adding that the current exhibition would bolster Indian exports of machines, equipment and engineering goods to Russia.
Source: IANS
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