The Manchester India Partnership (MIP) has launched a refreshed strategy to harness the power of its high-level networks in the UK and India. The strategy is guided by the UK India 2030 roadmap and has re-aligned itself with the updated Greater Manchester (GM) Industrial Strategy.
MIP was established in February 2018 by the Greater Manchester Local Enterprise Partnership, MIDAS – Manchester’s Inward Investment Agency and Deloitte to unite private businesses, academia and the public sector across India and Greater Manchester to build and strengthen trade, investment, cultural, and educational ties.
Over the years, it has developed into a soft power centre, which leverages the cultural and people connections to inculcate a spirit of collaboration between GM and India, thereby delivering opportunities for business and mutual prosperity.
In the wake of the pandemic and through challenges presented by the climate crisis, the UK and India have strengthened their partnership to seek solutions for issues presented in recent times, both showing strong resilience and clear opportunities for collaboration.
Greater Manchester’s Local Industrial Strategy provides the focus for this activity, engaging India in GM’s key areas of strengths that align with India’s growth sectors. These include Digital and Technology, Low Carbon, Advanced Manufacturing and Health Innovation.
Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham said: “The Manchester India Partnership has played a key role in developing and expanding connections between our city-region and India over the last few years. This renewed strategy will set out how that relationship can be strengthened in the future, based around our long-term ambitions for trade, investment, and innovation.
“Our city-region is home to more than 55,000 people from the Indian diaspora, and what this strategy also does is acknowledge the importance and the value of those cultural links that enrich and enliven our communities, and how they too can be a source of shared prosperity.”
Shehla Hasan, Executive Director Manchester India Partnership said, “Over 1,000 businesses in the Northwest exported over £310 million worth of goods to India in 2019 and in the financial year 2021-2022, India became the fastest growing economy in the world. Our aim is for Greater Manchester to be recognised as the strongest UK region as a partner for this sustained growth.”
