By IANS,
Kolkata : West Bengal is eyeing Italian technology and investment in leather, engineering and textiles, state industries secretary Sabyasachi Sen said here Friday.
“There is very high interest in our state about Italian leather and tannery industries. They have high-quality tanning technology and design. We want to bring such technology to Bengal,” Sen said at an interactive session in the presence of the mayor of the Italian city of Turin.
He said jewellery made in India was different from that sold in Europe. “We have good jewellery entrepreneurs and highly skilled workers here. So, we can look for partnerships in this sector.”
Besides, the minister said, there was also scope for Italian investment in textiles and engineering.
Sen, however, regretted that West Bengal had derived no dividend from the arrangement it entered into with Italian nodal body for investment Sinest. “We have not been able to forge any joint ventures. But we hope the arrangement will reap fruits in the future.”
Turin mayor Sergio Chiamparino said his city of one million people in north west Italy had a 55 million Euro economy.
“We had a low unemployment rate of 4.2 percent during the last five years. But like many other places of Europe, we are now starting to experience the first impact of the economic crisis,” Chiamparino said.
Chimaparino was in the city in connection with the Festa Italiana 2008 – the seventh edition of the annual flagship event of the Indo-Italian Chamber of Commerce.
Chamber sources said while Italy’s trade with India stood at $61.41 billion in 2002, the figure has more than tripled to $185.6 billion in 2006-07.