Mr. Onkar S Kanwar, Chairman, India Chapter of the BRICS Business Council, who assumed Chairmanship of the BRICS Business Council, has outlined a four-fold agenda during his tenure as Chair. The core mantra, he said, would be ‘Continuity with Consolidation’. Mr. Onkar Kanwar was speaking at the midterm meeting of BRICS Business Council in Moscow.
Mr. Kanwar said, “The agenda would emphasize on four tracks. First is aligning of the Council’s work with the priorities that have been set by our respective governments. We will strive to deepen this process and involve ourselves more with the respective authorities and regulatory bodies in our countries apprising them about our work and seeking guidance on how the council can support them in their own process.” Second, he said that the role of the New Development Bank and the support expected from it for carrying forward some of the ideas floated in the working groups is important. It will be a priority for the Indian Presidency to see how we can learn more about the project preparation and evaluation mechanisms of the NDB.
This can be accomplished by having a direct interaction with the President and his senior team and we would endeavor to do this at the time of the Summit Meeting in India. Third, while bringing regulatory coherence and eliminating administrative barriers are very important, “if we are to increase intra-BRICS trade and investments, I feel it is equally important for us to sensitize our business communities about the trading instruments and financing frameworks that are available with our financial institutions, commercial banks and development banks for promoting trade and investments with BRICS countries. I am keen that we bring together all our development banks including Export Credit Agencies and have a larger discussion with members of the business fraternity on doing business with BRICS nations,” Mr. Kanwar pointed out. “I also propose that we link up our National Investment Promotion Agencies as suggested in the Strategy for BRICS Economic Partnership adopted by our governments last year at Ufa, Russia,” he said. Fourth, is to develop a set of programs that Indian Chapter would organize in the coming months. “We already have a calendar listing out some of the key activities.
The Political Summit is scheduled to be held on October 15-16 in Goa. We will be organizing several thematic programs around that time including the First BRICS Trade Fair and Exhibition that was announced by our Hon’ble Prime Minister last year during his address to the Business Council members”. The BRICS Trade Fair will be organized in New Delhi from October 12 to 14, 2016, on the theme ‘Building BRICS – Innovation for Cooperation’. While there are several sectors of interest to BRICS countries represented at the Trade Fair, the focus will be to showcase some of the best technologies available across BRICS nations to address our main development challenges. The Fair will have a good deal of focus on Start-Ups. Therefore, it would be important to encourage young entrepreneurs from BRICS nations to connect with their counterparts at New Delhi Finally, it is proposed to have the meetings of all the BRICS Business Council Working Groups and their de-briefing to the Council on October 14, 2016 at New Delhi. The subsequent meeting of the BRICS Business Council to finalize the report and share it with the governments is proposed for October 15, 2016 at Goa..
