UAE investors eye infra, education, food processing, fin sectors: Goyal

Investors from the UAE are keen to invest in different sectors in India such as clean energy, infrastructure, education, healthcare, food processing, and financial services, Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said here on Thursday.

He was in Abu Dhabi for the 11th meeting of the India-UAE High-Level Task Force on Investments.

The airline sector holds a lot of promise for UAE investors in India as New Delhi is giving lot of thrust on travel and tourism sectors, he told reporters here.

Investors are very very keen to invest in infra projects, education projects, healthcare and are looking at food and food processing in a very big way," the minister said.

The UAE companies are also showing a lot of interest in financial services, he said.

"I believe that in the days ahead, we will see significant flow of investments both in public markets and in the manufacturing and services sector," he said.

Pharma, roads and highways, ports, other infra activities, clean energy, green hydrogen, solar and wind energy sectors are likely to see investments, the minister said.

Investments towards innovation and upstream and downstream projects in the petroleum and petroleum chemical sectors are areas of mutual interest, he added.

"I can say now that even the moon is not the limit (when it comes to investment relations)," Goyal said.

Between April 2000 and June 2023, India received USD 16 billion Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) from the UAE, which accounts for 2 per cent of the total FDI during that period.

The UAE Sovereign Wealth Funds (SWFs) invested over USD 10 billion in India during 2020-22.

Abu Dhabi Investment Authority (ADIA) is the principal Sovereign Wealth Fund of the UAE and one of the world's largest.

The UAE has committed to investing USD 75 billion in India's infrastructure sector over a period of time.

The Joint Task Force was established in 2013 to promote trade, investment and economic ties between the UAE and India.