Bilateral trade between India and Africa grew at a much faster rate of 32.4% compared to overall China-Africa trade that rose by 27% during 2008-2011.
During the period India emerged as the fastest growing export market for Africa growing by 41.8% while China grew by 28%, according to a report released jointly by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) and World Trade Organization (WTO).
The report which was released on the sidelines of the fourth WTO Global Review of Aid for Trade event held at its headquarters Geneva, also noted the India’s exports to Africa from 2005 to 2011 rose at 23.1%, lower than China’s which grew by 25.6%.
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The report – India-Africa Trade and Investment – said that while India started on a much lower based compared to China in the African market way back in 2005, the India-Africa trade gained traction with commodity exports from Africa and technology exports from India.
India is now Africa’s fourth largest market followed by Brazil in the sixth. On the other hand, China has piped US as the second largest market for Africa after European Union (EU). Brazil, China and India now account for a quarter of Africa’s total exports, thus becoming the three major emerging destinations for African goods. Similarly, the three emerging economies now account for nearly 22% of Africa's imports of $501 billion, up from 13% in 2005.
As far as African exports to India is concerned, crude oil and LNG comprises nearly two-thirds of exports basket. “Due to the persistent rise in global commodity prices between 2005 and 2011, value of Africa's exports to India have risen faster than the volume of commodity exports, thus exposing exports to global commodity price shocks,” the report stated.
India-Africa bilateral trade has grown from $1billion in 2001 to around $50billion in 2011-12. During India-Africa Ministers Round Table conference chaired by ministry of commerce and industry Anand Sharma in March, the bilateral trade target was set at $100 billion by 2015.
