Government needs to provide necessary technical support to services exporters for enabling them to exploit the global trade in the sector, Commerce Secretary Rita Teaotia said today.
She said that the country has huge potential in the sector in terms of enhancing exports, attracting foreign direct investment, job creation and pushing overall economic growth.
"We have a lot of potential in the areas of wherever there is skill as well as labour-based services," the Secretary said at a press meet on the 2nd Global Exhibition on Services (GES), to be held from April 21-23 in Greater Noida.
She said that the country needs to fix targets for the sector and there is also a need to understand how the global trade is really governed either through multilateral or bilateral agreements.
"So, there is need for us to provide the necessary technical support and the technical backup to our services exporters to enable them to exploit the global trade in services to the maximum extent possible," the official said.
Teaotia said that the exhibition, to be inaugurated by President Pranab Mukherjee, will showcase India's strength and opportunities to both domestic and foreign players.
At the event, Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman told reporters that government has taken several steps to give a boost to the services sector.
Sitharaman said participants from about 60 countries are expected to attend the exhibition.
"About 3500 B2B meetings have been finalised. So good response is coming," she said.
India's share in the global services trade is 3.15 per cent and it is "not huge", Teaotia said, adding India is the eighth largest exporter in the world.
"We have huge strength in terms of human resources. Our institutions are producing one of the finest professionals across services...We have the cost advantage...We have grown on the back of IT/ITeS services but it is not the only thing hat we export," she added.
Services sector contributes 53 per cent in GDP, 51 per cent in FDI and 28 per cent in employment.
The commerce ministry has been engaged with the states and different departments to simplify procedures and boost the sector's growth.
The focus of the exhibition will be on services like IT,
ITeS, telecommunication, healthcare, education, logistics, media and entertainment, R&D and space.
In global exports of services, India's rank has been improved from 11th to 6th during 2009 and 2013.
India had a trade surplus in services segment unlike in merchandise where India runs a trade deficit. It is important to boost services exports to finance the goods trade deficit.
Speaking at the occasion, CII Services Council Chairman Malvinder Singh said that the sector is growing at a healthy rate and considerable will come in the coming years.
"The sector has a future of boundless opportunity - in a world which is becoming rapidly digitized, geographical boundaries have already been made largely redundant and communication skills can be honed to perfection with the large scale traffic of opinions on social media," he said.
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The Department of Commerce, CII and the Services Export Promotion Council (SEPC) will be jointly organising the 2nd edition of the Global Exhibition on Services.
GES will be inaugurated by President Pranab Mukherjee on April 20.
An official statement said that the services sector remains the key driver of India's economic growth, contributing almost 66.1 per cent of its gross value added growth in 2015-16.
"The service sector is going through revolutionary change, which dramatically affects the way in which we live and work. New services are continually being launched to satisfy existing needs and to meet newer needs," it said.
The focus sectors in GES-2016 are - banking & financial services, education, environmental services, architectural services, healthcare, IT and Telecom and logistics.
The valedictory session on April 23 will be addressed by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.
"In 2016, we look forward to a robust and meaningful participation, both nationally and internationally. Ministerial delegations are expected from several countries - already almost 40 countries, 80 buyers from service sectors, 200 exhibitors and 15 Indian states, 20 PSUs, over 50 international companies have confirmed their presence and many more are expected over the next few weeks," it said.
It added that some main highlights this year would be a media and entertainment content market for the first time ever in the capital, a healthcare and a tourism mart to bring stakeholders together over MoUs and B2Bs, a food festival to represent cuisines of the world and spectacular cultural shows organized by ICCR and the I & B Ministry.
It is hoped that GES will catapult the services sector into the global radar and reinforce the role of the services to become the key growth driver of India's economic trajectory.
