Leaders of the Ukrainian foreign ministry haven’t visited India in eight years. During this time this large Asian country, the cradle of unique civilization, grew in population nearly to the China’s level and surpassed all the world’s countries in number of programmers working in there. For the influence in the global economy it surely took its place in the world’s top 10 states. Today ignoring India in country’s foreign policy is the same as not paying attention to, actually, a whole continent with enormous potential for trade and economic, scientific, technical, and humanitarian cooperation.
While Ukrainian political elite haven’t got down to serious search for powerful external tools for domestic modernization, fortunately, Ukrainian and Indian entrepreneurs haven’t stood still. Only in the period of January through August of this year the trade turnover between India and Ukraine increased by 31.4 percent and reached 2.1 billion dollars. The positive balance to the benefit of our country was 794 million dollars. In other words, trade with India for Ukraine under the current difficult financial and economic realities is an extremely important source of currency and one of the instruments for preserving hryvnia’s rate stability. It is equally important that we supply this country not only with metals and agricultural products, but also with turbo-jet engines, pumps, transformers, electric details, i.e., high technology products with high added value. It is noteworthy, that, even in the agricultural segment, the Ukrainian producers mainly supply to Hindustan peninsula not just grain and seeds but sunflower oil, that is the product that was deeply processed in Ukraine with all benefits associated with the process in terms of paying taxes and creating jobs. Indian market is well-known to many Ukrainian industrial giants. In particular, Ukrainian companies are among known players on the local market. For example, not so long ago a consortium Ukrindustria contracted for construction of coke complex in Naharnar worth 440 million dollars. Indian business, in its turn, feels more and more confident in our country, following the example of their countryman – legendary figure in business circles and one of the largest investors in Ukrainian economy Lakshmi Mittal.
Consolidate these achievements and create a political framework for the transformation of India into Ukraine’s real partner, with boosting trade turnover to the level of five billion dollars per year – these are the tasks the President Viktor Yanukovych set before me instructing to go to New Delhi on an official visit. It is no accident that elements of economic diplomacy clearly dominated over all others on my agenda in India. I think, this should be the model approach to visits to other foreign countries. Foreign policy has to and is able to ensure favorable conditions for domestic socio-economic growth. That is the philosophy the president believes in and this kind of approach has been the basis of Indian diplomacy, which in recent decades has gained enormous success on international arena, and with all certainty is now putting forth the question about providing the official New Delhi with the status of a permanent member of the UN Security Council.
In the Indian capital I was pleased to get the feeling that local politicians and businessmen are not simply interested in Ukraine, but are well aware of our potential, opportunities, and even problems. My conversations with the Indian counterpart Somanahalli Krishna, ministers of economy bloc of the Indian government, parliamentarians, and businessmen, without any exaggeration, were held in very constructive and businesslike manner and were devoted to finding practical ways to support the bilateral partnership in various fields ranging from geology to space. The negotiations have shown that the planned increase of trade turnover by more than 100 percent is quite a realistic goal and there are clear parameters for achieving it. Activation of political dialogue between Kyiv and New Delhi, which was, in fact, abandoned in previous years, will open the way for the participation of companies from both countries in major infrastructure, energy, aerospace, and defense projects – in all spheres, where it is hard for a business to work without agreement between governments.
I won’t make it a secret that we will have to make up for the lost time in a series of various parameters. Russian, Kazakh, Belarusian, and Central European companies, that have a set of proposals for Indian partners similar to what we have, have been working for a long time in India with active political support from their states. It won’t be easy to compete with them, but it is still possible. Ukrainian leaders understand that we have to come to India seriously and permanently, turning this huge country into a new important partner in the reforms implementation and modernization alongside with China, Turkey, and Arab states – all those parties, to whom Ukrainian government has not paid sufficient attention since the mid 2000s and who were consistently and decisively turned back to the priority stands of Ukraine’s foreign policy after the new president was elected.
