G20 trade ministers have discussed preventing large production capacities, created with government support in some geographies, from hurting manufacturing in countries that follow fair trade practices, including India, the US and Europe, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal has said.
Replying to questions from the Indian diaspora in Chicago about the G20 trade ministers meeting, which concluded late evening on Friday in Milwaukee, Goyal said the members also discussed the future of several elements of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), which is currently under severe stress, including the fact that many countries are using predatory pricing as they have overcapacity, and are dumping goods, much to the detriment of honest and fair trade.
Replying to questions from the Indian diaspora in Chicago about the G20 trade ministers meeting, which concluded late evening on Friday in Milwaukee, Goyal said the members also discussed the future of several elements of the World Trade Organisation (WTO), which is currently under severe stress, including the fact that many countries are using predatory pricing as they have overcapacity, and are dumping goods, much to the detriment of honest and fair trade.
“So, issues like this were highlighted by the United States…This G20 was under their presidency. And good discussions were held that we should all collectively work towards ensuring that certain geographies with very large production capacities, created at different points in time with government support, should not be allowed to hurt manufacturing in countries where fair trade and honest business practices are carried out, such as the United States or Europe or India,” he noted.
He said that though it was a fruitful set of conversations at the meetings, differences of opinion prevented the release of an outcome document.
India is the most preferred destination to set up data centres, citing low-cost infrastructure and energy, a large pool of young talent and tax-free benefits until 2047, he added.
India has received nearly USD 200 billion of commitments for investments in data centres, the minister said.
“India is the world’s best location to house data centres…low-cost infrastructure, low-cost energy, low-cost data, a big pool of youthful talent, and finally, for those who are using cloud services or data storage for international purposes, tax-free until 2047, totally tax-free. That’s why I dare say this is the most preferred location for data centres,” he said.
“I invite all of you to also take advantage of that.” Goyal said that at present 60 per cent of the installed capacity of 520 gigawatts is clean energy (solar, wind, hydro, nuclear) in India.
“We have a large quantity of clean energy, renewable energy available. Data centres normally prefer to work on clean energy. It’s at a lower cost through the life cycle. If you want 100 per cent clean energy 24 hours, you’ll probably get it at 11 or 12 cents,” he said.
He added that creating data centre infrastructure in India will not cost more than one-fifth or one-fourth of what it’ll cost in America or Europe.
“And finally, and most importantly, the talent, the youth, 14 lakh, 1.4 million STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) graduates come out of colleges,” he said.
On a question about ease of doing business and lower-level corruption in India, the minister said, “I am glad that you have raised these issues because these are genuine problems that many times investors face in India”.
He added that the present government has made a very serious effort towards ease of doing business.
The minister said Prime Minister Narendra Modi has successfully eliminated corruption at higher levels of government and “we are very confident this will percolate down as we ease processes, procedures, policy, make it easier to do business”.
He said that in the first quarter of next year, “we’ll have a very large Indian delegation, multi-sectoral, come here” to showcase India’s growth story and opportunities.
Further, Goyal said India has finalised a number of free trade agreements that would provide Indian companies access to markets with a combined GDP of over USD 70 trillion.
India is negotiating 6-8 more such trade pacts, which would open up opportunities in markets with another USD 15 trillion in GDP.
“India will become the centre of an international web of global trading relationships covering nearly 75-80 per cent of the world’s economy,” he said, adding that India’s defence exports have increased from Rs 680 crore to Rs 38,000 crore.
