December 2, 2018
Bangla Govt extends BGBS 2019 invitations to 18 LAC countries
Eighteen Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries have been invited to the fifth edition of the Bengal Global Business Summit (BGBS) in February 2019. This is another sign that the summit is growing in stature worldwide. Several Asian and European countries are taking part every year.
The invitation to the LAC countries, which is a first for the BGBS, was announced by the State Finance and Commerce and Industries Minister, Dr Amit Mitra on November 29, while speaking at the conference, ‘India-LAC Business Cooperation: Special focus on West Bengal’, organised by Indian Chamber of Commerce (ICC) in Kolkata.
Elaborating on the issue, he said that there are a number of core competency areas that Bengal and the LAC countries have in common, like leather, textiles manufacturing, information technology (IT) and a few others, and so, in these, there is potential for investment which will be beneficial for both sides. There can even be partnerships at the state level between Bangla and the states of LAC region.
The minister said that one company in Bangla has recently invested in Chile for the manufacturing of mining machinery. And now it is time for the LAC countries to come and invest big in Bangla.
About the foreign collaborations, Dr Mitra said that six countries have already agreed to partner Bangla in BGBS 2019, including Germany and Italy which Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee visited in September this year.
At the ICC conference, the minister also discussed the deep cultural and social linkages between Bangla and the LAC countries. He further said that Bangla is one of the leading States in India in terms of human capital generation and employment creation.
Significantly, the event was attended by the ambassadors from eighteen Latin American countries – Venezuela, Brazil, Paraguay, Cuba, Colombia, Mexico, Guatemala, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Ecuador, Argentina, Panama, Dominican Republic, El Salvador, Peru, Suriname, Bolivia and Uruguay.
Regional Groups in LAC like ALBA, CARICOM, Mercosur, Pacific Alliance & SICA gave PowerPoint presentations at the session.
