The Economic Times
UK biz wary of India, China threat
SUDESHNA SEN TIMES NEWS NETWORK [TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 28, 2006 09:40:12 PM]
LONDON: It's become a question of survival – and western business is running scared. The question business leaders of developing economies are asking is no longer "Can we afford to ignore China and India?" The question now is, "Can we survive in the globalised world competing with India and China?"
In its annual navel gazing exercise about the future of British industry, the over-riding theme was competition from India and China. Not there, far away, where you sell MNC brands, but right here, in London, Wales, Birmingham and Coventry. And Labour or Tory, American or British, they all sounded eerily similar. Wake up. Smell the coffee. And understand that the balance of economic power is shifting from the west to the east.
"This is a good time to take stock of the UK economy," said prime minister Tony Blair, in a sentimental last address at the Confederation of British Industry's annual government-industry interface. " And the impact of Asian businesses is the background against which any discussion has to take place," he said. While he may not see eye to eye with with his successor Gordon Brown on many other issues, this one, they sounded like someone hit the replay button.
And so again with Henry Paulson, US treasury secretary. They were preaching to the converted. We're doing pop polls, with happy jingles rocking in the background. Is UK business ready for the competitive challenge from China and India? A thumping 80% of the elite delegates, comprising senior leaders of local industry, said NO.
In ten years time, which nation will be most influential? China, say 76%, and India said 24 %. In a CBI survey of senior executives from the FTSE 350 companies, a vast 70% felt that the UK is a poorer international business location than it was in 2001.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer and prime-minister in waiting, Gordon Brown, started off with a diatribe against a rising tide of protectionism in the UK and US – though between the lines, the diatribe is mostly directed at Europe and the EU, with whom the UK is at loggerheads on the issue."Over the next fifteen years, up to half the world's future growth will come from India and China.By 2020, the G-7 share of growth, will fall to just one third," he warned.