India needs to look at ESG factors to attract massive FDI: USISPF president

24 Aug 2020 Evaluate

US India Strategic and Partnership Forum (USISPF) president Mukesh Aghi has said that India needs to look at environmental, social and governmental (ESG) factors to attract major investors and get the sustained foreign direct investment (FDI) of $100 billion per annum that the country needs to get back to 8-9 percent growth. He said the investment pool around the world is estimated to be about $45 trillion, of this $12 trillion comes under ESG factors.

Aghi said ‘if India is going to focus on attracting large scale, long term institutional investors, then it needs to look at the ESG factors. Today India is around 130-133 on the ESG factors. It needs to start coordinating... it's no longer World Bank ranking (on ease of doing business). Investors are rewarding companies that are looking at ESG factors’. He also said ‘institutional investors are looking at ESG factors of nations itself as they increase their share of investment into that environment. It is important, India starts seriously looking at that aspect. And, when you look at, if the Democrats come in (power in the US) those factors also will play a stronger role than the current administration.’

Describing H-1B as an election issue, USISPF president said the reality is that there is a massive shortage of software engineers in the country. He said ‘if US is going to maintain the technological edge on a global basis, it needs those engineers. We can't produce them locally. And so from a geopolitical perspective, if India and USA aligned, then there can be more cooperation on H-1B also.’

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