Obama's India visit in sync with US export strategy

The US President Barack Obama's visit to India, starting from Mumbai, fits into the American National Export Initiative (NEI) which seeks to double American exports in the next five years and creating millions of jobs, officials said.

The US Commerce Secretary Gary Locke, who will accompany Obama on his India visit on November 6, said recently in the Silicon Valley that "rebuilding America's economic foundation also means helping more the US companies sell their goods and services to 95 per cent of the world's consumers who live outside our borders".

He said that the NEI would expand the US government's export promotion efforts in all its forms.

The US exports in 2009 were $1.05 trillion and it would like to double the same by 2014 under the Obama's economic initiative.

Rising India with 8.5-8.8 per cent economic growth and a huge 1.2 billion people market is of great interest to the US companies.

Though the US economy has been registering growth since the last five quarters, worries on account of unemployment remain.

If the US wants to gain from the rising Indian economy, what is that India can get out of the relationship, which should cement with the Obama visit?

"American core competence lies in technology-intensive areas-be in manufacturing, defence, advance information technology and bio/nano technology. Most of these technologies are proprietal in nature.... So, there can be a win-win situation and complementarity between India and the US with the transfer of the technology," Ficci Secretary General Amit Mitra said.

He said that once the US is willing to transfer its proprietal technology, India should encourage foreign direct investment in these areas.

Of his three-day visit, Obama will spend first two days in India's financial capital-meeting CEOs from the US and Indian companies in smaller groups. He would also address an India-US Business Summit, organised by the US-Indian Business Council, Ficci and CII.

"One simple example of how a rising India translates into greater prosperity for the United States is Mumbai's new airport, which involved US high-end manufacturing and services by some of America's finest firms," USIBC quoted its President Ron Sommer.

The largest petroleum refinery in the world at Jamnagar was recently completed by Bechtel.

"Boeing aircraft are filling India's skies, powered by GE and Pratt & Whitney jet engines – helping India maintain a burgeoning civilian airline industry growing at 30 per cent annually".