PPP key to services export growth

"Investment in skills development through public-private partnership is the key for services growth in India", said Mr. Anand Sharma, Union Minister for Commerce and Industry at the National Conference on Services Exports, organized by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) today in New Delhi.

He called for a joint effort to build Institutes of Excellence in India and said the agenda of the Government was indicated by the  setting up of National Skills Development Corporation with a corpus of Rs 30,000 crore.

Services sector contributed Rs 106 billion to India's exports but admitted there was need of more employable manpower in view of the 40 per cent shortage of skilled manpower globally.

India can raise its share in the world services export market to 4-5 per cent in the next few years from 2.7 per cent now if the government can negotiate some real market access and modify domestic policies to make industry more competitive, Mr Sanjiv Goenka, chairman of the CII Services Council said welcoming the Minister.

To attract more foreign investments to the services sector, Mr Goenka called for further investments in road, ports, airports, urban transportation and energy infrastructure through public-private partnerships as well as investments in future looking sectors like engineering prototyping and testing facilities to boost sector exports.

Goenka said areas that need focus include easier domestic policies & taxes, identifying at least three more key sectors to target global markets, seeking GATS visa for short term assignments, negotiating Mutual Recognition Agreements and Totalization Agreements, providing impetus to small and medium sized service exporters and by making effective use of WTO and FTA platforms for real market access.

For the sector to expand, it was necessary to develop and roll out in parallel specialized educational and research options to augment the availability of trained and talented professionals through decentralized higher education.