Emerging as an engine of global growth

Over the past 40 months, there have been four head of nation visits that put the spotlight firmly on catapulting India-UAE relations into a completely new orbit. The UAE is already India's third largest trade partner with bilateral trade standing at ~$50 billion in 2017-18. The relations were officially upgraded to 'comprehensive strategic partnership' in 2016 and the on-ground execution of the intent is beginning to take shape.
India is entering a fresh new cycle of very high economic growth, while the UAE is keen to transition its economy beyond oil. This has opened up a range of fresh opportunities for collaboration. The first and foremost spark has been observed in enhanced infrastructure cooperation. Operationalising the $75 billion India-UAE infrastructure fund is perhaps the biggest game changing initiative on the horizon.
As India makes a dash towards world-class modern infrastructure over the next decade, it opens a host of opportunities for infrastructure companies and long-term investors in the Gulf. Second, the financial services sector provides immense scope for partnership. The UAE is positioning cities like Abu Dhabi and Dubai as global finance centres. This opens opportunities of collaboration between Mumbai and GIFT City with DIFC (Dubai International Financial Centre).
These centres and respective stock exchanges can emerge as spring boards to access each other's investor pools. The current financial blip seen in cities like Dubai can be used as an opportunity to build an even more robust financial structure for the future. Next, education and skills are another area of cooperation. The emergence of Dubai, which is host to some of the leading Indian education brands, is a significant reference for India's own efforts in internalisation of higher education.
Both countries have recently reached an agreement on skills harmonisation, wherein India's programmes for up-skilling workers shall be matched with the requirements of job market in the Gulf nations. This is extremely timely as India is expected to be the only country with a surplus skilled manpower by 2030. Finally, both countries could look to set up an innovation corridor. India has emerged as one of the top three nations in terms of technology start-ups and the ecosystem has improved immensely under the personal guidance of the PM.
The UAE on its part has been named the top country for entrepreneurs in the MENA region by the Global Entrepreneurship and Development Institute recently. This provides for an excellent new scope of cooperation where UAE entrepreneurs can test their innovations in a controlled environment in India before a global market launch. An institutionalised India-UAE innovation corridor can enhance potential benefits for all stakeholders.
Both India and the UAE have made bold moves to transform their relationship from transactional to strategic. The future for this partnership is even brighter as the Indian economic story continues to improve with each passing day, fortified by extremely dynamic private sector enterprises.
India is likely to emerge as the engine of global growth over the next five to 10 years. The UAE has a credible and reliable economic partner in India that can not only enable its move to diversify the economy, but also contribute in jumpstarting an innovation fuelled economy, supporting sustainable growth.