core sector communique

Indo-German Trade

In 2011, the trade between India and Germany reached Euro 18.4 billion (Rs.119600 crores). In 2011 Germany exported approx Euro 10.76 billion (Rs 70,000 crores) of goods to India. Out of this the machinery export was approx Euro 3.69 billion (Rs 23,790 crores). This was an increase of about 18% in comparison to 2010.

The exports from India to Germany attained a value of Euro7.5 billion (Rs 48,750 crores) in 2011. This was an increase of 21%.

Increased demand for German machinery in 2011

In 2011 the total import of machinery from Germany reached a volume of Euro 3.69 billion (Rs 23790 crores). This was an increase by 18 % compared with the same period of time of the previous year.

In 2011 among the machinery sectors, major demand of German equipment was for Power Transmission (10.5%), Material Handling (7.6%), Textile Machinery (7.5%), Machine Tools (7.2%) and Construction Equipment & Building Material Machinery (5.4%).There are other sectors like Plastics, Printing, Paper, Food processing and Packaging which are growing steadily in India.

In 2010 out of approximately Euro 12.2 Billion (Rs.79072.5 crores) of machinery imported by India, Germany had a share of around 16.2 %, marginally behind China (20.2%) and ahead of Japan (11.4%) and USA (9.2%)

Maharashtra with 57% share of German investments remains to be the most attractive destination for German investments in India. Pune has lately become the hotbed for new German investments. Karnataka and Gujarat are other important destinations.

The trade volume has increased nearly six times since 1991, with exports to Germany increasing five times, and imports from Germany to India almost seven times. There are more than 1300 German companies in India as on today, which have created more than 210,000 jobs. German investment in India has always been accompanied by that ever faithful partner: technology. This adhesive bond has in fact strengthened with the passage of time.

Indo-German ties have come a long way in the past 500 years and both the countries have cooperated in number of areas right from machinery to space research upto marine science. While India was Germany’s 24th largest trade partner in 2010 (Statistisches Bundesamt, 2011), the previous year saw India climbing up the ladder finishing as 11th largest partner in the mechanical engineering sector.