Dealing with Chinese cos needs rationality: Jairam Ramesh

New Delhi, Nov 20 (UNI) India need to take a rational view while at the same time security concerns can not be over-ruled completely in dealing with Chinese companies, Minister of State for Commerce Jairam Ramesh said today.

Acknowledging that China was a competitor in the global market, he said both countries have cooperated with each other in jointly securing contracts in countries like Syria, Sudan and Columbia.

''There is an urgent need to include Indian corporate sector's views on bilateral relations between India and China as it should be a part of the dialogue process between the two countries at different levels,'' he said at roundtable on ''India- China: Drivers of the World Economy'' here.

The bilateral trade between India and China has grown tremendously in the last five years and was likely to reach 24 billion dollars by the end of this year in comparison to 17.5 billion dollars last year.

''It is the composition of trade that needs attention,'' Mr Ramesh said.

Presently, majority of Indian exports to China comprise raw materials and primary goods like iron ore etc, and China adds value to these and captures the world market by exporting value-added products. ''For example, we export mint to China, China exports mint-based products to the rest of the world. There must be a serious effort to expand the trade basket to include more value-added products for exports to China,'' he added.

On bilateral investments, the minister said, there is a huge gap between the FDI approvals and actual inflows committed by the Chinese companies.

India has approved 260-million-dollars FDI from China but the actual inflow is just three million dollars. In comparison, China approved 150 million dollars of FDI from India and actual inflow into China was 50-60 million dollars.

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