India invites investments from Nordic-Baltic nations

New Delhi: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Wednesday sought investments from Nordic-Baltic countries in the development of ports, renewable energy, food processing and fisheries, saying India has put in place institutional frameworks for closer business-to-business cooperation.

Addressing the India Nordic Baltic Business Conclave here, Jaishankar also said that India has opened embassies in Tallinn and Vilnius recently and plans to start an embassy in Latvia very soon.

He said India has set up an ambitious target to set up renewable energy capacities of 450 gigawatts by 2030, lined up port-led development involving over 600 projects under the Sagarmala program, while the food processing sector has the potential to attract USD 33 billion over the next decade.

"So these offer real opportunities for the NB8 (Nordic-Baltic) countries for investment, for trade and for tech collaboration and exchange of mutual expertise and best practices. The growth of fisheries, too, is a domain of natural collaboration," Jaishankar said.

The minister said India's combined trade in goods with the NB8 countries was around USD 7.3 billion in 2022-23, and the cumulative FDI received from Nordic countries since 2000 stood at USD 4.69 billion.

He said more than 700 Nordic companies were present in India, and close to 150 Indian companies have their presence in that region.

"So this is the economic baseline on which we need to build further," Jaishankar said.

He said India's talent pool, digital adoption and start-up ecosystem align well with the Baltic region's prominence in e-governance, digital innovation, supply chain management, and other frontier industries.

"As open economies, they have adopted a model of a responsive government, a prudent fiscal policy, a favourable investment climate, and flexible labour markets, hence a natural synergy to expand and deepen our relationship further with this region," Jaishankar said.

The minister said India's space programme has opened up new opportunities for collaboration with the NB8 group.

"Given the fast-transforming nature of space technology, the significance of launching sites in the Arctic region and commercialisation of space and geospatial sectors in India can boost public-private collaboration," Jaishankar said.