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Overview

India's engagement with Africa, especially at a time when the partner region's geopolitical and geo-economic situation is changing, deserves serious consideration. Africa is increasingly being viewed as a land of opportunity. Africa and India have social and economic relations dating back many centuries.

Deepening relations have been reflected in the patterns of trade and investment, as well as people-to people interactions, cultural exchanges and cooperation at the continental and at the regional and bilateral levels. Trade and investment relations have witnessed strong growth in the recent past, reflecting expanding economic opportunities in both Africa and India.

The bilateral relationship has expanded to include socio-political and commercial issues, capacity building, development cooperation, and economic and technological initiatives. As “development partners”, Africa and India have demonstrated eagerness and enthusiasm to enhance bilateral relations through initiatives that seek to strengthen their partnership against the backdrop of deepening South–South cooperation and mutually beneficial expectations and outcomes.

India’s total export with the various countries of Africa region stood at US$ 37.00 billion whereas total import from the region stood at US$ 30.56 billion during the year 2023-2024 (Apr-Jan).

Objective

India- Africa partnership has seen phenomenal growth; India's bilateral trade with Africa has now reached US$ 67.56 billion in 2023-24 (Apr-Jan). While investment wise, India has been a steady partner in Africa socio-economic development, huge investments by several Indian companies in sectors such as infrastructure, telecom, education, IT, Healthcare, agriculture, etc. valuing to over USD 54 billion make India 5th largest investor in Africa.

The Government of India through its several mechanisms such as Lines of Credit (LoC's) have greatly contributed to the development of Africa. The objective of the Sessions shall be to identify the opportunities that can be leveraged by the Indian businessmen in several key sectors post pandemic, through focused discussions with Indian diplomats in the continent, heads of African missions in India, Banks, Chamber of Commerce, etc. Under the current pandemic situation, it is important for India to maintain the pan-African tier of engagement on issues such as globalization, multilateralism, health, solar energy, climate change and the like need to be discussed with Africa.