Region’s firms urged to tap into ‘terrific’ opportunities in India

This marked the first time the Confederation of Indian Industry had brought a delegation to Yorkshire and included representatives from the State Bank of India, Air India and Indian law firm Khaitan & Co.

Toby Greenbury, a consultant for Khaitan & Co, who advises on international strategy, told the audience in Leeds: “The opportunities in India are still terrific.

“The demographics are still enormously compelling. We read a lot about India actually at the moment not doing very well, but this is a relatively momentary lull in its growth.

“I think for those people who are brave enough to go into India now, this is a terrific time to go, when the rupee is at 40 per cent or something below the value you would have expected a year ago.”

In August, the Indian rupee slumped to a record low close to 69 per dollar as investors fretted over a record current account deficit, hefty fiscal deficit and slowing growth.

But, speaking to the Yorkshire Post, Mrutyunjay Mahapatra, the regional head for the UK of the State Bank of India, vouched for the currency.

He said that “the long- term story of the rupee as a currency remains intact”, pointing to its recent bounce-back.

The rupee has stabilised since Raghuram Rajan, the new central bank governor, assumed office on September 4 and announced a series of measures to boost the currency. However, yesterday it saw its steepest fall in two weeks ahead of the US Federal Reserve’s two-day policy meeting outcome due to be released today.

The outcome of the Fed’s meeting will be a key determinant of what the Reserve Bank of India chooses to do at its monetary policy review on Friday.

The Yorkshire Asian Business Association hosted the event yesterday in partnership with law firm DLA Piper at its offices in Leeds and in collaboration with the Leeds City Region Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP).

Roger Marsh, chairman of Leeds City Region LEP and a former senior partner of professional services firm PwC in Leeds, told the audience that the Leeds City Region has key strengths in sectors including: health and life sciences; financial and professional services; innovative manufacturing; low carbon and environmental industries; food and drink; and the digital and creative industries.

He said that the region, with a “significant” population of three million, is the largest city region in economic terms outside of London and is “a major contributor” to the UK’s economy, with more than 100,000 small and medium-sized businesses.

Mr Marsh said that the region also has the UK’s largest concentration of universities.

Speaking to the Yorkshire Post, he said that improvements need to be made in terms of attracting inward investment to this re- gion.

“Events like today help begin the conversation with the emerging economies of the world, and when I say the emerging economies of the world I mean those that are south of us, into South America and beyond, those that are east of us, into India and beyond, and when you think about the pace of change in some of these places, for example China is industrialising at ten times the rate the UK is reindustralising and on a scale a hundred times bigger so we’ve got our work cut out on the one hand.

“On the other hand we’ve got a lot of unique assets we need to leverage more effectively globally so we need to move the dial from national to international to global,” added Mr Marsh.

The Indian rupee closed at 63.37/38 per dollar yesterday compared with 62.83/84 on Monday.

The unit dropped 0.85 per cent on the day, its biggest single-day fall in two weeks. It moved in a wide range of 62.95 to 63.6450 during the session.

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