FDI pours in

Despite apprehension of a slowdown in the economy, foreign investors are bullish on India. Foreign direct investment in April increased by 127% to $3.74 billion over the same period last year. FDI in April 2007 was $1.64 billion only.India attracted $25 billion FDI in 2007-08 and has set a target of $35 billion for the current financial year 2008-09.Exports have grown by 31.5% in April to $14.4 billion from $10.94 billion in the same period last year.Of the $3.74 billion FDI in April, manufacturing accounted for $1.86 billion.The major sectors receiving foreign investment were services, telecom, housing and real estate, construction, computer software and hardware, automobile, power and metallurgy.RBS, FIAT Auto Spa, Singapore Investment Corporation and Cisco of Mauritius were the major investors in April. Predictably, Mauritius continued to remain the preferred route for foreign investors accounting for 45% of the total inflows. In the last four years since April 2004, India has attracted a total of $49 billion of FDI, government data said.
India has emerged as the world's fourth most attractive emerging market for manufacturing business foreign investment, for services it has just managed to enter a top-20 list released by PwC.In PriceWaterhouseCoopers' latest emerging markets rankings EM20, based on the countries' FDI attractiveness, India has been ranked fourth, ahead of its three Bric peers China, Russia and Brazil, for the manufacturing business.However, for the services business, India has been ranked last at the 20th position in the list.