The Hindu : Business : `Outsourcing will enhance job prospects'

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, Oct 21, 2004

Business

Business

`Outsourcing will enhance job prospects'

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI, OCT. 20. The Union Information Technology and Communications Minister, Dayanidhi Maran, today said erection of protectionist barriers against outsourcing would not survive in the face of overall economic gains. Arguing in favour of offshoring, he said it was bound to play an important role in securing domestic, high value-added jobs. It had resulted in higher growth and led to new employment opportunities in medium term perspective, he said.

Addressing the OECD Global Forum on International Investment organised by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

(OECD, the Union Government and the Confederation of Indian Industry, he said to maximise gains of offshoring, a better course of action could be to speed up some measures in an attempt to field as many winners as possible.

He pointed out that the biggest IT companies had begun outsourcing tasks because it made their services cheaper. This was expected to encourage the spread of ICT (information and communication technology) throughout the business world, he said.

Mr. Maran noted that the global volume of the offshoring market was in the range of $10 billion to $50 billion but maintained that costs were not the only argument in favour of offshoring. "Availability of skilled staff in abundance is another consideration,'' he said. The Minister pointed out that about 5,000 IT graduates in Germany and 25,000 in the U.S. entered the labour market each year as against 120,000 in India. "Therefore India is a preferred country,'' he said.

He described India as a mother country of offshore outsourcing with a market share of 70-90 per cent and export of software and services, which stand at $12 billion, would grow to $38 billion by 2008. He said the Indian telecom sector was also growing fast and the teledensity was expected to reach 15 per cent by 2007 which would need an investment of $22 billion. "The investment in handsets and other attachments is going to be substantial,'' he commented.

Printer friendly page
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Business