Mexico seeks to expand economic, political & cultural footprint in India

Kolkata: Federico Salas Lotfe, Ambassador of Mexico to India said Mexico is looking to expand its economic, political and cultural footprint in India.

He took part in an interactive session at the Bengal Chamber on Monday afternoon. Cyber crime and data theft are other areas where Mexico look to India to share technology since both governments share the challenge of digital governance, as a drive to combat corruption.

"In 2018 Mexico had a 10 billion dollar trade figure and India was one of the top 10 leading trade countries of Mexico. We have close to 200 businesses in various sectors from India and we have around 20 Mexican companies in India. Apart from business and cultural contacts, as we have witnessed at book fair we are trying to expand people to people contacts and also tourism. Indians are among first 20 nations to visit Mexico as tourists", he said.

Total trade between India and Mexico has gone up by 240 per cent and there are 70 Indian companies operating in Mexico, said BB Chatterjee, president of the chamber.

Ambarish Dasgupta, former president of Bengal Chamber said most of the goods like gems and jewellery and aluminium that go to Mexico are manufactured in Bengal.

Bengal has three main components, namely the Energy sector, MSME and deep seaports that serve to link ASEAN countries.

"The vision of Bengal is to be a strong logistic hub. So there is a good potential of these sectors with regards to Mexico," he said.