CIF meets with Canada’s new High Commissioner to India

Charter Members of Canada India Foundation welcome Canada’s new High Commissioner to India, Mr. Stewart Beck.

Charter Members of Canada India Foundation held productive meetings in Vancouver and Toronto with Canada’s new High Commissioner to India, Mr. Stewart Beck, on December 14 and December 16, 2010.

The meetings underscored the increasing profile of CIF, as the High Commissioner demonstrated great awareness of the organization and expressed his appreciation of the work being done by it in the Canada-India corridor. Welcoming the High Commissioner to his new role, Mr. Ramesh Chotai, Chair of Canada India Foundation, said that his appointment and his background a trade commissioner was consistent with CIF’s stated emphasis on a stronger trade-focused Canadian High Commission in India.
Addressing the CIF Charter Members, High Commissioner Beck said that his target for bi-lateral trade with India was $15 billion in 5 years. He also projected the number of companies doing business in India to increase from 250 to 750 in that time. He agreed that Canada needs to catch up with other countries with respect to doing business with India in the nuclear sector, and looked forward to an early ratification of the civil nuclear agreement with Canada by India.

Responding to questions from Charter Members about great student enrollment from India in Canadian Universities, Mr. Beck said that student visas from India to Canada have increased from 3500 to 14000. Other areas that he saw great potential for Canada-India trade was in Water treatment/sanitation, food logistics, rural development and specialized areas such as shale gas technology.

Mr. Beck’s advice to Canadian companies wanting to do business in India was to demonstrate greater staying power, giving the example of Canadian entrepreneur Terry Matthews. He also cited McCain foods potato plant facility in Gujarat as an example of overcoming perceived structural deficiencies to achieve high quality results. In general, he said that Canada and India can work together to identify core competencies of the two countries for mutual benefit and hoped to work with organizations such as Canada India Foundation to achieve this objective.

Mr. Beck also said that he intended to move forward the media co-production treaty between the two countries, with expectation of its signing to coincide with IIFA in June. In the meantime, he was looking forward to meeting CIF Members again at the Vibrant Gujarat summit in January 2011, in which Canada was a Country partner and will be bringing a strong delegation.

For more information about Canada India Foundation, please contact Kalyan Sundaram, Executive Director at ksundaram@canadaindia.org or (416) 779-5237.