Union Minister of Commerce and Industry & Railways, Piyush Goyal inaugurated the Global Exhibition on Services (GES) 2019 on November 26 in Bengaluru, Karnataka.
This is the 5th edition of GES and is an attempt towards escalating the Indian services bar in the global arena by exploring 12 Champion Services Sectors, encompassing participation from 74 countries and hosting sector specific knowledge sessions. India is looking to attract investments and partnerships in strategic areas like aviation and space programme, infrastructure, telecom projects, financial management and accounting, content, design, media distribution and outsourcing publishing work, Intellectual Property management services and environmental/ social impact assessment.
Objectives
Through GES the Government of India seeks to engage industry and Governments across the world and promote greater exchange of trade in services between India and rest of the world, Department of Commerce, Ministry of Commerce and Industry in association with Services Export Promotion Council (SEPC) and Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) has created a dedicated platform, the which is an annual event. GES also looks to enhance strategic cooperation and develop synergies to strengthen multilateral relationships between all stake holders, tap the potential for services exports and increase FDI inflow.
About SEPC
SEPC is an export promotion council set up by Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Government of India in 2006 as an apex trade body to facilitate service exporters of India. SEPC actively contributes to the formulation of policies of Government of India and acts as an interface between the services industry and the Government. It has a membership base of 4800 members from the 14 service sectors.
SEPC is organizing Nations Cup (International eSports Championship) in association with Electronic Sports Federation of India (ESFI) during GES 2019. The Nations Cup will be one of the key highlights during GES and will open up multiple avenues for the services industry particularly in eSports, gaming and animation.
India is also aspiring to promote niche tourism like the Buddhist circuit, adventure and camping tourism.Uttar Pradesh is the partnering state mainly to promote the tourism sector and will have a separate state pavilion in GES 2019.
To promote Service Sector
In order to attract more players in the services sector India has liberalized its e-visa regime in three categories: e-tourist, e-medical and e-business to promote these sectors. Multiple entry tourist and business visas for a period of five years are now available to nationals of all countries for the benefit of medical tourists. Separate immigration counters and facilitation desks have been provided at six Indian international airports of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bengaluru and Hyderabad.
