World Economic Forum to mark 25 years of ties with India

The World Economic Forum will hold its three-day India Economic Summit here from Sunday, with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as the key speaker, to mark 25 years of active engagement between the Davos-based organisation and India.

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Some of the top corporate leaders will participate at the event as co-chairs, including PepsiCo chairperson Indra Nooyi, Renault chief executive Shumeet Banerji, Accenture chairman William D. Green and ICICI Bank managing director Chanda Kochhar.

The Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) is the forum's partner for the event.

Apart from the general business opportunities and challenges amidst global economic crisis, security and gender issues and education will be new areas of highlight in the discussion.

'As the world slowly emerges from the crisis, the time is propitious for India to take stock of its competitive strengths, as well as those areas hindering its rapid growth and development,' said forum founder Klaus Schwab ahead of the high-profile event.

'This year also marks the 25th anniversary of the World Economic Forum's engagement in India, providing an excellent opportunity to reflect upon how India's competitiveness has progressed over this period and what remains to be achieved.'

The forum also released its India Competitiveness Review 2009 Thursday to provide a comprehensive overview of the country's current competitiveness landscape, highlighting strengths and problematic areas, and shedding light on its future economic prospects.

'India remains a favourable destination for global trade and investment as we see the signs of economic recovery,' said CII director-general Chandrajit Banerjee, commenting on the new study.

The competitiveness review has drawn from the assessment by the New Delhi-based CII and the 13th chief executive survey of PricewaterhouseCoopers that projects how India's business leaders see the nation's resilience and competitiveness at a time of crisis and recovery.

'Despite the economic downturn, most Indian chief executives are confident about the future. Sixty-three percent of respondents said they were very confident of their revenue growth prospects over the next 12 months,' said Jairaj Purandare, co-author of the study.

'Yet, they are also realistic and understand that there are challenges ahead.'

According to the review, India displays competitive strengths in areas of business sophistication, innovation and financial market expertise and can also rely on fairly well-functioning institutions.

But there is considerable room for improvement in several of the basic drivers of competitiveness, such as infrastructure, health and primary education, even as runaway fiscal situation prevents much-needed investments.

'The diffusion of information and communication technologies remains very low by international standards. Bureaucracy, over-regulation and corruption still affect the functioning of markets, in particular in the labour market.'

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