Export Development Canada (EDC) announced today an annual record in the amount of financing it provided to facilitate business between Canadian and Indian companies in 2015, nearing an estimated USD 1 billion.
“2015 was EDC’s most successful year to date in India, and there’s a lot more room to grow,” said Nathan Andrew Nelson, EDC’s Chief Representative in India. “We’ve been working closely with Global Affairs Canada and provincial trade partners to provide Canadian companies with direct access to many of the country’s top-tier companies.”
Overall, Canadian and Indian companies used more than an estimated CAD 2 billion of EDC services for their trade transactions in 2015.
EDC’s permanent representatives in Mumbai and New Delhi made more than 100 introductions between Indian buyers and Canadian companies in 2015, and co-led three significant trade missions in the oil and gas, information and communications technologies, and infrastructure sectors.
As an example of how EDC leverages relationships with top-tier Indian companies, EDC established a new USD 500 M financial protocol agreement for the Tata Group in 2015. The financing agreement allows Tata to access the financing for transactions involving Canadian companies across all of Tata’s global supply chains.
EDC has provided more than USD 3.7 billion in financing over the past decade for Indian companies that have, or are open to, business with Canadian companies. “This,” said Nelson, “established EDC as a long-term, reliable financing partner for companies trading between Canada and India.” EDC has been doing business in India for more than 30 years, and has had a permanent presence there since 2005.
Nelson noted that EDC will be adding staff to its Mumbai office this year to handle increased demand for its services, reflected in the following growth figures (CAD) relevant to Indo-Canadian trade:
- Exports of goods to India grew by 52 per cent between 2010 and 2014, and exports of services grew by 58 per cent during the same period
- Overall bilateral trade in goods between Canada and India totaled CAD 6.3 billion in 2014 while trade in services in 2013 – the last year for which figures are available – totaled CAD 1.6 billion
- India accounted for 6.1 per cent of Canada’s total global exports of goods in 2014, up from 5.2 per cent in 2010
- India’s GDP is nearly USD 2 trillion and is forecast to grow by more than 8 per cent this year, the fastest growth in the G20
EDC plans to continue its focus on the key relationships that helped propel the record-setting year, while also reaching out to even more Canadian companies doing business with the world’s ninth-largest economy.
“India presents huge opportunities for Canadian exporters,” added Nelson, “many of which will benefit from the type of assistance EDC can provide to help them do business there.”
