Switzerland keen on trade with India

Describing India as one of the few countries with a major potential for development, the visiting President of Switzerland, Pascal Couchepin, said on Monday that the current volume of Indo-Swiss trade and investment was much below expectaion.

"Taking into account the complementarities of the Swiss and the Indian economy, the current volume of bilateral trade and investment is much below of what can be achieved," Couchepin said in New Delhi at an industry conclave jointly hosted by Confederation of Indian Industries and Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry.

Switzerland was keen to continue its dialogue with the Indian authorities and economic players to promote mutually beneficial relations, he said, adding there was a huge growth potential in trade and prospects were good.

While trade between the two countries grew rapidly during 1992-96 the same momentum could not be sustained in most of the following years.

Couchepin said he was nevertheless happy to note that this year bilateral trade was once again showing good improvement.

On multilateralism, he said, for both countries, "Cancun failure has been a negative result, and I note with satisfaction that India, like Switzerland, hopes 'Doha negotiations' will start again as soon as possible."

Couchepin said while machinery and chemical and pharma were traditional sectors of financial and technical collaborations, the service sector, after further liberalisation, was also attracting higher investments from Switzerland.

Minister of State for External Affairs Vinod Khanna said Switzerland had emerged as one of the favourite destination for tourists from India with an annual average growth rate of 25 per cent, mainly because of extensive shooting of Indian feature films there.

Agreeing with Couchepin, Khanna said the bilateral trade in 2001-02 at $1billion was well below its true potential. Switzerland is India's 13th largest trading partner and ranks 16th in terms of approved investments.

Bilateral Investment Protection Agreement and Double Taxation Avoidance Agreement were in place to facilitate greater economic interaction, he noted.

An emerging facet of the bilateral trade is the increased export of software services to major banks, financial institutions, manufacturing concerns and stock exchanges of Switzerland. In 2000-01, India's software exports to Switzerland stood at 66.1 million dollars, he added.

Khanna said he was pleased that the two sides had signed agreements on science and technology, and disaster management. He said the agreement on science and technology will help explore avenues of cooperation in biotechnology, nanotechnology and genome research.