Korean Business delegation visits Mumbai for trade

Mumbai, Feb 27 (UNI) A 15-member high level business mission, led by Byun Bong Duk, chairman of Sangnam Chamber of Commerce&Industry in Korea, visited Indian Merchants Chamber (IMC) and interacted with members looking for both trade and investment opportunities in the country.

IMC president Nayan Patel said that political relations between India and Korea could be traced back to more than 2000 years, when as early as in 48 AD, Princess of Ayodhya, Queen Hur Hwang Ho, was married to Korean King Suro Kim and their lineage continued even today. This political bond got extended to people-to-people level when Korean people accepted Budhism from India.

In the past three decades, when Korea emerged as a leading industrial nation, India looked at it with great admiration and sought to learn from its experience. ''Today, there are hardly any middle class family in India, which does not make use of Korean products manufactured by corporates like LG Electronics, Hyundai, and Daewoo.'' Indo-Korean Two-way trade was around USD 4.1 billion in 2004-05, and was rising steeply, he added.

Mr Duk said that Sangnam city had one million population, and was located near Seoul. The 34-year old Sangnam Chamber was one of the 72 chambers in the country and one of the top five in Korea. It had 3000 members from various corporate sectors.

He said ''Of these 12 members, who are present in the delegation, represent various industry sectors like electronics, plastics, textiles, IT, gas&oil pipelines, precision industry, nuts&bolts, machinery and equipment, home automation, technology consultancy and export&import services.'' In the past two decades many members of the Chamber heavily invested in manufacturing bases in China for taking advantage of not only its vast market, but cheap labor. But in the past couple of years, Korean companies also set up manufacturing units in Vietnam, and now they wanted to come to India in a big way, he said.

''We look forward to IMC to assist the Korean companies in locating right business partners, and facilitate more one-on-one interaction between Indo-Korean businessmen. We hope to build a special relationship with IMC,'' he added.

Hemal Mehta, Associate Director of KPMG, made a detailed presentation on various aspects of Indian economy and investment prospects in India for the benefit of the delegation members.

UNI