Thinking of organising mini-ministerial of WTO members: Prabhu

India is considering holding a mini-ministerial meeting of about 40 World Trade Organization (WTO) members to discuss ways to increase global trade, Commerce Minister Suresh Prabhu said today.
These are days of partnership as working with all trade partners will benefit the world, he said.
"We are thinking of organising a mini-ministerial in India sometime in March, wherein we would like to invite friends like the US, Africa and Latin America, about 30-40 of them, and try to find out how we can actually create a new big trade volumes in the world," he said.
The minister was speaking at the third edition of the geo-political conference, 'Raisina Dialogue'.

Prabhu said the idea of the meeting is to deliberate upon ways to "create bigger markets", rather than finding out ground of contentious issues.
He also informed that his ministry is working on a new trade policy, which benefits global commerce.

On promoting innovation in the country, he said, "we are identifying 6-7 emerging industries" in areas like life sciences, energy and environmental management, with a view to promoting the culture of innovation.
He expressed the hope that with the growth in the country's economy, India's GDP would touch USD 5 trillion in the coming years.
Further, he added that countries should not follow protectionist tendencies and work to increase global trade.

Speaking at the function, US ambassador to India Kenneth Juster said that good education system, risk taking, healthy capital market and protection of intellectual property rights are key to promote innovation.
However, citing example of cyber attack, he said innovation can also have negative implications.
He also said that open market and free flow of goods help increase in global trade, investments and creation of jobs.
Juster added that the US does not follow protectionist policies and is one of the open economies in the world.