Merchants’ Chamber of Commerce & Industry organised a Special Session with Mr. Maxim V. Kozlov, Consul General of the Russian Federation in Kolkata on ‘India-Russia Economic Partnership: Trade and Investment Prospects’ here today at the Chamber. Ms. Ekaterina Tyurina, Vice Consul of the Russian Federation in Kolkata was also present at the Session.
Mr. Amit Saraogi, President, MCCI, focused on giving efforts to diversify trade between the two countries by identifying new sectors with opportunities such as pharmaceuticals, agriculture, tourism and livestock. He highlighted several challenges like geographical constraints, trade imbalance, regulatory environment, currency issues and competing partnerships to be addressed to take the bilateral trade to its full potential.
While giving the theme address Mr. Arun Kumar Garodia, Chairman, Council on Foreign Trade, MCCI emphasized more on the role of a state in facilitating bilateral ties and viewed that West Bengal is now all set to play a lead role in facilitating bilateral economic and commercial relation with Russia. Mr. Garodia also underscored the importance of FTA/ CECA with the Eurasian Economic Union.
Mr. Garodia further mentioned several areas of collaboration opportunities specifically focussing on West Bengal such as ship-building, medical devices and energy saving technologies. He further highlighted immense opportunities in mobility sector in eastern India.
Mr. Maxim V. Kozlov, Consul General of the Russian Federation in Kolkata in his address mentioned that India-Russia trade volume has grown 5 times over the last 5 years. While prioritizing the strategic partnership, the two countries have set the bilateral trade goal of achieving US$100 billion by 2030.
The envoy mentioned that technology remains the corner-stone of Russia-India partnership underscoring focused sectors like edu-tech, digital marketing, cyber security. He further emphasized on the export of skilled manpower from India to Russia.
He also pointed out that India is the main supplier of medicines, smartphones to Russia. The Sectors including energy, IT, pharmaceuticals, machineries, cyber security, agri-machinery, bio-technology, nuclear energy offer huge scope for both nations to enhance their co-operation.
He mentioned that India-Russia have decided to sign the Mutual Trade Protection Agreement, to boost overall trade. He further informed that the customs services of Russia and India have signed an agreement on mutual recognition of national institutions of the Authorised Economic Operator (AEO) in May 2024.
The session ended with a hearty Vote of thanks proposed by Mr. Munish Jhajharia, Vice President, MCCI. He proposed that MCCI would be happy to host a High-Level Business Delegation from Russia to Bengal to explore collaboration in different sectors.
