India-Romania Business Forum (IRBF) was launched

Last Friday, 26 May 2017, at INDIA HOUSE, Ms Ana Birchall, Romanian Minister-Delegate for European Affairs along with the Ambassador of India to Romania, Dr AVS Ramesh Chandra launched the India-Romania Business Forum (IRBF), an initiative to bring together over 70 Indian and Romanian businessmen and entrepreneurs to boost bilateral trade and investment, a press release sent to ACTMedia by the Indin Embassy reads.

The Forum will also be a focal point for organising events to enable interaction between stakeholders and act as a clearing house of information and exploring opportunities for new ventures. The Forum will be headed by Mr Shekhar Asthana from the Indian side and the Governor of Transylvania Bank is likely to head the Forum from the Romanian side.

According to Ravi Chandar, First Secretary, Commercial Representative & Consular Officer, bilateral cooperation between India and Romania dates back to the 1950s involving projects in India in petroleum, petrochemicals, power and metallurgy. In 1993, an Agreement on Trade and Economic Cooperation granting mutual MFN treatment and trade in hard currency was concluded. Existing bilateral institutional mechanisms to promote trade and economic cooperation is in the form of Joint Economic Committee (JEC). The last JEC was held in New Delhi on 7 April 2017 at the level of Secretary of State at the end of which a Joint Protocol was signed in which areas and sectors for cooperation were identified and future course of action in each was envisaged.

The bilateral trade is around US$ 500-600 million in the few past years and there is considerable potential for increasing this in future.  Value of bilateral trade as per data published by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India, since 2012-13 to the latest available is given in the table below.

The Main Indian exports to Romania include electrical and mechanical  machines, organic chemical, pharmaceuticals, automotive components, plastic and rubber materials, textiles, Iron and Steel, etc. The Main Indian imports from Romania are edible vegetables, organic and inorganic chemicals, machinery and mechanical appliances, electrical machinery, automotive components etc..

There is potential for mutual sharing of know-how and expertise in frontier and er and wood products) have their presence in Romania. Other Indian investments are by Prodigy Technologies (IT software company), Prime Healthcare (trading in drugs and medical devices). Indian-owned capital from Nigeria renovated a metallurgy plant, Transdanube Industries in Oltenita (in agri-sector).  Evaluserve also has offices in Bucharest and Cluj-Napoca. Other Indian Businessmen own a number of medium-sized establishments in electronics, textiles, trading, restaurants, real estate and construction, handicrafts, and yoga and wellness centers in Romania.  

Arcelor-Mittal has considerable investments from Europe into Romania. In 2001, the Sidex Steel Plant in Galati was acquired by Shri Laxmi Mittal’s Ispat-LNM Holdings (now Arcelor-Mittal SA). In 2003, Mittal Steel also acquired the “Tepro” company in Iasi, “Siderurgica” steel mill at Hunedoara and the “Petrotub” pipe-making unit at Roman.

There are a number of other Indian companies who are interested in investing and trading with Romania and include Franco India Pharmaceuticals Pvt Ltd, MSN Laboratories Pvt Ltd (in Pharmaceutical sector); ASHIDA Electronics Pvt Ltd (in Industrial Power Supply equipment); MRIDA Group (in agriculture and Processed Foods sector); SYNERGY Group (in Minerals and Metallurgy) and ELCOM Group (in defence communication equipment) etc, and are in various stages of negotiations with the Romanian counterparts and officials.
There are a large number of Indian nationals working in Romania in IT, Financial sector, Telecom, Real Estate and in private businesses.  

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