Over 80 cos participate in Indian chem exhibition in Nigeria

Over 80 companies are participating in the second edition of Indian Chemicals, Agro Chemicals and Cosmetics Exhibition (Chemexcil) in Nigeria's economic capital of Lagos.
Speaking at the first day of the event yesterday, Indian Deputy High Commissioner Suresh K Makhijani, who represented High Commissioner Mahesh Sachdev, said there is a huge increase in this year's participation from only 35 last year.
Participants are companies that deal in diverse range of products, including adhesives, basic chemicals, agrochemicals, cosmetics, and toiletry soaps, detergents, pesticides, bio-pesticides and fertilisers.
"India is the largest democracy in the world and Nigeria is the largest democracy in Africa. Our bilateral relations have been excellent all along.

"The GDP of the two countries is growing at over 7 per cent per annum - during last year and April 2012 - March 2013 has reached the figures of USD 17.40 billion and India has thus become one of the largest trading partners of Nigeria," he said.
Main items of India's exports to Nigeria, he said, include rice, machinery, instruments, transport equipment, pharmaceuticals, electronic goods and plastic products.

He added that "there have been large investments by Indian companies in chemical sector, such as Indorama, Dabur and Godrej which have created sizeable number of jobs in Nigeria".
The Acting Executive Director, Chemexcil, Mumbai, S G Bharadi said the purpose of the exhibition is to strengthen and expand the existing business, promote India's chemical exports and to create a positive brand image of the products thus resulting into many more joint ventures and technology transfer.

"Chemexcil's total export performance during the 2012-13 has been USD 13,855.4 million as compared to USD 11,270.8 million of the similar period last year, registering an increase of 22.9 per cent," he said.
He said that despite the global economic down turn being witnessed in recent times, "Chemexcil has done very well during 2012-2013...Chemical exports have shown the modest increase of 20 to 25 per cent".
He added: "The export of the items covered under the purview of Chemexcil to Nigeria during the period of 2012-2013 have been USD 90.2 million as against USD 85.5 million of the corresponding period last year, registering a growth rate of 5.6 per cent".

Bharadi explained that the basic chemical sector which consists of mainly petrochemicals accounts for over 70 per cent of the total chemical market in Nigeria.
The event is being supported by Pesticides Manufacturers and Formulators Association of India, was organised by Basic Chemicals, Pharmaceuticals and Cosmetics Export Promotion Council, India.