Germany's Merkel pushes big business in India
NEW DELHI (AFP) — German Chancellor Angela Merkel was pushing for big business with India Tuesday during a state visit aimed at invigorating trade and security links between Europe's largest economy and the Asian giant.
Merkel, who has already visited China and Japan this year, is leading a high-powered business delegation hoping to reverse what she admitted were years of German neglect of the subcontinent.
"We can see that the potential for Germany-India cooperation has not been fully explored yet," she told a gathering of business leaders, pointing to potentially huge opportunities in tackling India's creaking infrastructure.
"I find open doors for us here," she told reporters, saying Berlin needed to pay as much attention to India -- where economic growth is running at about nine percent -- as it has to China.
She also pointed to India's need for nuclear energy as another business opening, should New Delhi manage to implement a deal with the United States that would bring the country into the global loop of nuclear commerce.
"From the point of view of Germany, we would like to see India incorporated into the international (nuclear safeguards) regime... then Germany and India could do a lot together," she said.
In a joint statement, the two countries said they were working on new initiatives in trade and bilateral investment, energy, science and technology, education, culture and defence.
Bilateral trade has doubled in the past three years to 10 billion euros but both had "agreed to work towards an annual trade volume of 20 billion euros for 2012," the statement said, pointing to the "development of a new phase" in ties.
A defence cooperation agreement covering the exchange of information and cooperation in the fields of defence research, armament procurement and general defence technology was also signed.
India is currently the biggest arms purchaser among emerging nations.
Merkel's visit has included talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi, the powerful head of the ruling Congress party, with topics including the war in Afghanistan and the situation in military-ruled Myanmar.
The chancellor's advisers have said the environment would be high on the agenda in her talks with Indian leaders, who have signalled the country is not ready to compromise its economic growth by accepting binding limits on greenhouse gas emissions.
But the overall push was for big business, with her delegation including executives from Siemens AG, insurance giant Munich Re and pharmaceutical multinational BASF.
Speaking to the German radio station RBB-Inforadio, the head of the Indo-German Chamber of Commerce said Germany was looking for a head start in the fast emerging market of 1.1 billion people.
"We Germans are not the only ones. If we are here today, tomorrow there will be the Americans, and after that the French. We have to show that we are engaged, that we are serious," Bernhard Steinruecke said.
The United States frequently sends large business delegations to India, and US President George W. Bush made a landmark visit in 2006.
Russian President Vladimir Putin was in New Delhi earlier this year pushing defence and atomic energy business, while French President Nicolas Sarkozy is due in January 2008 to push for similar contracts.
