Canadian firms ‘too U.S.-centric,' Indian official says

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A senior Indian economic minister says Canadian companies are too focused on the United States and as a result risk missing out on billions of dollars worth of investment opportunities in his country.

 

“I'm looking at Canada looking beyond NAFTA,” Kamal Nath, India's minister of road transport and highways, said in an interview Thursday.

 

“I don't think they have looked at India,” Mr. Nath said of Canadian companies. “They have heard about India, but they have not looked at India because they have been too U.S.-centric.”

 

The comments came in response to a question about why Mr. Nath, who is in the middle of three-day road show aimed at rounding up international investment, felt the need to solicit interest in an economy that is among the fastest growing in the world.

 

Mr. Nath's remarks reflect the widely held perception overseas that Canada's economy is an appendage of the United States, home of the world's largest economy to which Canadian businesses have easy access thanks to the North American Free Trade Agreement.

 

(Courtesy of The Globe and Mail)