PM Gati Shakti is one of the key tools to clarify investment in infrastructure planning of India
New Delhi, March 23 (FN Bureau) President Designate, CII & Executive Vice Chairman, TVS Supply Chain Solutions Ltd. R Dinesh on Thursday said PM Gati Shakti is one of the key tools to clarify investment in the infrastructure planning of India. Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) Eastern Region held the Conference on DIGITISE – Defining Investment Growth Through Image, Technology, Infrastructure & Sustainability in the East in Kolkata on Thursday, along with its Annual Regional Meeting 2023. Emphasizing on Global Value Chain (GVC) as one of the primary B20 focus areas of CII, Dinesh, spoke about the huge potential India has in Global Value Chain (GVC). He spoke about creating efficiencies in logistics as one of main drivers for this. This, according to him, is in the improvement of efficient utilization of roads as well as truck capacity. Making logistics efficient will help to optimize logistics costs.
“To be a part of the GVC, we must have the right amount of investments in infrastructure, sufficient data flow about the suppliers, 100 percent visibility as the company moves up the Global level through leveraging digital solutions. lies in securing livelihood through businesses”, Dinesh said. Also present at the session, the Vice President of CII, Sanjiv Puri, Chairman and Managing Director, ITC Ltd, was emphatic about sustainable development. According to him, India has tremendous scope in innovation with a large opportunity in the renewable energy space especially in the hydro and solar power sector. A fast-track development in these sectors will make India competitive. India must focus on resilience, innovation and the policy friction in RE space need to be removed to make projects viable.
On the sustainability aspect , he mentioned that there needs to be ‘Responsible Competitiveness’ amongst businesses without which they could not sustain on the long run. Puri, speaking about the need for controlling emissions said, “Emission intensity in India is much lower than global average but that is also because access to energy is not available across. Excess use of energy in the western world needs to be relooked at and action needs to be made on faster reduction of emissions. Developed economies have committed to sustainable financing and that needs to reach the developing economies faster.” “Investment in the innovation space is a necessity. Technology related to storage, carbon capture needs to be boosted. Government of India has made right policy intervention. Policy friction in the states need to be worked upon. Also, carbon pricing and an efficient carbon market is necessary in India. CII-ITC CESD, which is one of the ten CII Centers of Excellence is engaging with groups that are working in the carbon credit market,” he said. Chandrajit Banerjee, Director General, Confederation of Indian Industry speaking about CII’s role as the B20 secretariat spoke among other things the need for gender balance, bringing more R&D to India, and CII’s emphasis in implementation of ESG and a focus on Africa.
With CII leading the B20 initiative, 100 workshops and conferences are planned to be organized with B20 countries participation across the country. This will open huge opportunity for investments in India. Speaking at the Plenary Session on DIGITISE, H E Barry O’Farrell AO, High Commissioner of Australia to India Australian High Commission to India, mentioned that MOU signed between India and Australia on Strategic relationship in 2020 is driving the relationship. He said that Australia is looking for opportunities in India in battery storage space. Peter Cook, Acting Deputy High Commissioner in Kolkata, British Deputy High Commission in Kolkata, said that UK has gone through a lot of transformation through leverage of technology. Leveraging technology in education will help hugely in innovation thereby attracting investments from countries. He added that investing a huge sum in R&D will help companies earn long term profits. Taking on the discussions about gender diversity, Asha P Pillai Co Chairman, CII IWN Western Region & Global Group Planner for Information and Digital Technology, Shell stressed on the concept of 3Ms; Marriage, Maternity & Mobility which are the three social cultural fabric which leads to women dropping out of the workforce. She said, ‘What is seen as a leadership trait in men, is not seen as the same with women’. She added that unconscious bias training can act as a solution for corporates.