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The Indian rubber industry has been invited to invest in Vietnam, a country consuming only 15 per cent of it annual output of 900,000 tonnes of natural rubber (NR).
A delegation of the Vietnam Rubber Association visited India recently and met leading members of the All India Rubber Industries Association (AIRIA). India is one of the largest importers of NR from Vietnam; more is imported here only from Indonesia. Vietnam's NR export to India jumped to 51,273 tonnes in 2012-13 from 28,114 tonnes in 2011-12.
It also plans to boost domestic rubber manufacturing and has targeted 1.2 million tonnes of production, plus an increase in domestic consumption from the current 15 per cent to 40 per cent of the NR produced. Hence, it wants to strengthen business ties with the Indian rubber industry, said Niraj Thakkar, president of AIRIA. "We are working out the feasibility of a delegation to Vietnam soon," he said.
According to Government of India data, trade between India and Vietnam grew to $6.1 billion in 2012-13 and is likely to cross $7 billion by 2015.
