Mbeki's India visit holds promise for SMEs

Thursday, 02 October 2003, 19:30 IST
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JOHANNESBURG: Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in India and South Africa will benefit from a preferential trade agreement expected to be finalised as President Thabo Mbeki visits India this month. Indian High Commissioner Shiv Mukherjee said here at the opening of a seminar on the relationship between SMEs in the two nations that the agreement would eventually lead to free trade agreements between India and South Africa. Mukherjee said there had been a great number of reciprocal trade fairs and delegations between India and South Africa in the decade after relations between the two countries resumed following the end of the apartheid era, but there needed to be a lot more. But he made a personal plea for a change to the approach of what he referred to as "wholly Indian exhibitions". "We have had them in Durban and in Johannesburg by Indian companies. These do have a place but my preference, having been involved in this for more than three decades, is for what is happening here at an established trade exposition like SAITEX, (where more than 40 Indian companies are exhibiting with 43 other countries). "Similarly, South African companies should participate in specialised trade fairs in India like the India International Trade Fair. "The advantages are pretty clear. Firstly, these are established international fairs where you don't have to spend huge amounts of money to make people come there. "It is easier to contact the kind of people that you want. Another advantage is that participation by exhibitors in a fair that is established and where there are lots of exhibitors from other countries compels you to improve the quality of your exhibition." Mukherjee said exhibitors needed to help break the myth that SMEs produced goods that were of inferior quality. "The fact is that not only in developing countries but even in developed countries of the world, SMEs form the backbone of industry."
Source: IANS