The relationship between Qatar and India is an old and enduring one. According to the ministry of external affairs data, the total bilateral trade between both countries reached USD 12.33 billion in FY 2018-2019. However, the Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) of Qatar into India has been a modest one, but its contribution to India’s energy security is extremely significant. To understand more on how to increase investments coming from Qatar into India, The Free Press Journal and SIES in association with Invest India are organising a webinar session ‘Financing India — with focus on Qatar’.
The session will be held on November 12 from 3 pm onwards. The panellists for the session are (in alphabetical order) Gopal Balasubramaniam, Partner, Head of Audit, KPMG, Qatar; Deepak Mittal, Indian Ambassador to Qatar; and R Seetharaman, CEO, Doha Bank. The session will be moderated by R N Bhaskar.
According to Statista, as of December 2016, the foreign direct investments into India from Qatar in 2016 totaled USD 17.8 million. Qatar is not among the top five investors in India but the country has high-profile investments and agreements in place. In 2019, some of the high profile investments into India from Qatar are: Qatar Investment Authority (QIA) investing USD 150 million in BYJU’s and USD 450 million in a unit of Adani Transmission Ltd. QIA has also invested USD 200 million through primary equity issuance in Bharti Airtel’s arm Airtel Africa Ltd.
In terms of trade, India’s export to Qatar during 2018-19 was USD 1.61 billion and India’s import from Qatar was USD 10.72 billion. The bilateral trade during 2019-20 (till November 2019) stood at USD 6.8 billion.
Qatar’s key exports to India include LNG, LPG, chemicals and petrochemicals, plastics, and aluminium articles. This country accounts for almost 80 per cent of LNG imports by India, and 80 per cent of such imports are by the Indian-government controlled Petronet LNG.
India’s key exports to Qatar include cereals, copper articles, iron and steel articles, vegetables, fruits, spices, and processed food products, electrical and other machinery, plastic products, construction material, textiles & garments, chemicals, precious stones and rubber.
India is among the top three largest export destinations for Qatar and third largest sources of Qatar’s imports.
