Join us for the India, China & America (ICA) Institute's Global Virtual Seminar Series Tu, June 10 at 11am EDT.

In 2007, the Chinese and Indian retail markets together were worth about $1 trillion. By 2012, that figure will jump to $1.7 trillion as increased prosperity delivers greater spending power, creating hundreds of millions of new consumers in the process.

But the two big Asian markets are at different stages of development. "Modern" or "organized" retail has 20% of the total retail spent in China, while in India, the figure is just 4%. The comparable figure for the United States is 85%.

The world's two biggest international retailers, Wal-Mart and Carrefour, have been operating in China for years, but are yet to gain much traction in India. Both retailers plan to have Indian wholesale operations by 2008-09.

India's modern retail sector is growing much faster than traditional retail. But because it is starting from such a small base, it will not match the size of traditional retail for perhaps 20 years. Even so, the Indian opportunity is luring many new entrants. They include such big Indian names as Reliance, Bharti and Birla, who are gearing up for battle against incumbents in India's store wars.

Like their counterparts in China, Indian retailers face big challenges. There is a global war for talent, a desperate need for efficient supply chains, and both China and India must deal with the political sensitivities of vast rural hinterlands.

Business journalist Geoff Hiscock, author of "India's Global Wealth Club" (2007) and a forthcoming book on the Indian retail scene, will present this webinar exploring this retail revolution.

The only cost may be your long distance charge to dial in.

Date: Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Time: 11:00 AM - 12:00 PM EDT

Space is limited.
Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/393478071

15 - 18 July 2008
Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre
Hong Kong, China

The Broadband World Forum Asia www.iec.org/events/2008/bbwf_asia is designed to help service providers meet the challenges of offering revenue-driving broadband-enabled services while evolving their networks, operations, and business models in a new world of competition.

Session programming will examine the range of broadband content, entertainment, applications, access strategies, service management, and integration that form the backbone of the profitable network operator while providing a unique venue to evaluate strategy and make informed decisions. Programming is complemented by a cutting-edge technology exhibition where attendees can receive a firsthand look at the latest broadband applications, solutions and services from leading technology organizations.

As a member of ICA, enter code VIPICA when registering to receive complimentary Exhibits PLUS access or 30% discount from standard conference rates. Register

Are you doing business in world's biggest democracy and fastest growing market?
Are you planning to?

The Georgia Tech Center for International Business Education & Research (GT CIBER) and the U.S. India Business & Research Center (USIBRC) are organizing India and the U.S: Growing Market Opportunities - a symposium on June 16th and 17th, 2008 with support of The Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce and the U.S. Commercial Service. The symposium is sponsored by USIBRC, NIIT Technologies, InterContinental Hotels Group and Arnall Golden Gregory.

Symposium
Date: Tuesday, June 17, 2008 8 am to 2:00 pm
Venue: Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce

Reception
Date: Monday, June 16th, 2008, 6:00 pm to 8:00 pm
Venue: Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce

Cost:
Reception and Symposium - $125 per person
Symposium only- $ 90 per person (Students and Academics $60/person - contact the host for discount information)
Reception only- $50 per person

For online registration please visit - https://epay.gatech.edu/C20793_ustores/web/store_cat.jsp?STOREID=47&CATID=97

If paying by check, please make your check out to Georgia Institute of Technology and send it to the address below.

For event information, sponsorship opportunities and registration please contact:
Ani Agnihotri, US India Business and Research Center (USIBRC)
415 Lakehill Court, Alpharetta, GA 30022
Phone: 404-394-6678
E-mail: usibrc@gmail.com

India, the second largest newspaper market after China (The Financial Express, Jun 4)
India has emerged as the second largest newspaper market in the world by buying 99 million newspapers daily, according to World Association of Newspapers (WAN)'s figures released at the 61st World Newspaper Congress and 15th World Editors Forum in Göteborg, Sweden. China leads the pack with highest (107 million) number of dailies sold everyday. The two most populous countries of the world have also ended up as the two largest newspaper-buying countries. China and India are followed by Japan, with 68 million copies, United States with nearly 51 million and Germany with 21 million copies.

India, China seen fuelling inflation in Eurozone (Financial Express, Jun 4)
Echoing the recent controversial statement by US president George W Bush, India's burgeoning demand for food and energy is being seen as a significant contributor to rising inflation in the Eurozone, and could help prompt far-reaching fiscal and structural changes in the region. Headline inflation in May within the 15-nation common currency area rose to a high of 3.6% in May, against 3.3% in April, well above the European Central Bank (ECB) long-term target of 2%. According to a recent eye-opening survey quoted in the local media, 60% of Italian households cannot save even 100 euros (around Rs 6,500) a month, thanks to rising prices.

India and Other $60 mn trade target with China to be met: India (Business Standard, Jun 5)
India is keen to learn from China's "remarkable success" in developing Special Economic Zones and expects the trade target of $60 billion between the two countries to be surpassed before 2010,External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee said today. "The trade target of $60 billion by 2010 set by our two prime ministers is very likely to be surpassed before 2010," Mukherjee, who is on a four-day visit to China, said at the inauguration of the Consulate General of India in the booming Guangzhou city of Guangdong province.

Taiwan's 40 Richest (Forbes, Jun 4)
Among the standouts is real estate billionaire Chao Teng-Hsiung, chairman of Farglory Land Development, whose shares have nearly quadrupled in the past two years, giving him a net worth of $1.8 billion. In the past year, construction stocks jumped 42%, compared with an 11% overall rise in Taiwan's main index. Another big beneficiary of hopes for increased numbers of visitors from China has been owners of tourism companies. As a group, their stocks have increased by 58% in the past year and 80% since the end of last year. That rise helped Steven Pan, whose family is the majority shareholder of the Grand Formosa Regent hotel in Taipei, land on our list with a net worth of $580 million. Paul Liao and family, the owners of the island's popular yet unlisted Howard Hotel chain, are estimated to be worth some $1 billion.

China-Gulf Economic Relations (Council on Foreign Relations, Jun 4)
Trade relations between China and the six countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have broadened dramatically over the past decade. The relationship is dominated by oil, and growing Chinese energy demand makes it likely that large-scale oil flows between the two sides will continue to expand. China and the GCC states are also diversifying their bilateral economic relations beyond oil, a process accelerated by swelling foreign exchange reserves. Yet experts also caution against overly heady trade estimates, at least in the short term. Factors including mutual cultural wariness and infrastructural shortcomings continue to limit the speed at which economic expansion takes place, no matter how eager business leaders might be to develop relations. In the long run, however, experts say a "New Silk Road" could emerge as a force to be reckoned with economically-and perhaps also politically.

CNPC Niger deal extends China energy role in Africa (Reuters Africa, Jun 3)
China's state oil company has won a $5 billion deal to develop oil reserves in eastern Niger in the latest major Chinese investment to secure energy resources in Africa, officials from both countries said on Tuesday. Under the agreement signed in Niamey late on Monday, China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) agreed to bring into production within three years the large Agadem block, which has proven reserves so far of 324 million barrels, Niger's government said. The top oil firm in China will also build a refinery with capacity of 20,000 barrels per day near the southern city of Zinder, and a 2,000-kilometre pipeline to export the oil. The total estimated investment of $5 billion is China's biggest in the Sahel state, where Chinese companies are also involved in the exploration and development of uranium.

Subsidised energy in Asia seen fading out - Moody's Economy.com (Forbes, Jun 5)
Moody's Economy.com believes the end is nigh for subsidised energy in Asia, in the wake of widely-anticipated announcements by India and Malaysia that they will be sharply curtailing fuel subsidies. The move follows similar cuts in Asian countries like Indonesia and Taiwan, among others. Retail petrol prices will rise roughly 10 percent in India and 41 percent in Malaysia, but the cuts are seen as necessary steps as the runaway rise in the cost of crude oil leaves large gaps in government budgets. Nevertheless, higher fuel prices will have an impact on both inflation and growth.

FACTBOX-Energy profiles of the G8 plus China, India, Korea (Forbes, Jun 5)
Energy ministers from Group of Eight rich nations and three other major oil consumers will meet in Japan's northern city of Aomori on June 7 and 8. The Group of Eight, together with China, India and South Korea, accounted for 64 percent of the world's primary energy demand in 2005, according to the International Energy Agency.

Telecom Players Focus on Africa (Wall Street Journal, Jun 5)
Amid a global scramble for new subscribers, telecommunications operators and investors are taking a sudden shine to a place with lots of potential customers: Africa. Last month, an Indian suitor walked away from merger talks with Africa's largest mobile carrier, MTN Group Ltd., only to be replaced by another Indian company.

Lost Opportunity in Chinese Telecom Restructuring (Business Week, Jun 3)
The pieces of China's telecom reorganization have fallen into their well-telegraphed place. But the exercise has been wholly focused on the domestic market with the aim of bringing China Mobile back to Earth. What it really misses is the chance to prep Mobile and rival China Unicom to become global carriers. Most of the growth in the mobile business is in emerging markets-India, southeast Asia, Africa in particular.

UNCTAD blames India, China for rising food prices (NDTV.com, Jun 4)
United Nations Conference on Trade and Development on Wednesday said rising food demand in emerging economies like India and China has led to a 54 per cent rise in prices in the past one year even as World Food Security Summit here is hotly debating the issue vis-a-vis biofuels. ''As rising demand for food resulting from economic growth in such countries as China and India has combined with droughts and high energy prices, the basic cost of food has climbed 54 per cent in the past 12 months,'' UNCTAD's Secretary-General Supachai Panitchpakdi said at the summit.

New eating habits force revolution on China's farm (Financial Times Deutschland)
China, a small net exporter of rice and largely self-sufficient in wheat, has been something of a spectator in the global food crisis of recent months, with Beijing's role confined to tightening scrutiny of exports to prevent profiteering. "There is no grain crisis in China at the moment, and there won't be for some time into the future," says Cui Xiaoli, a researcher at the development research centre, a think-tank under China's cabinet. The country's inflation hit 11-year highs in recent months, almost entirely because of an increase in food prices, but the government and many economists argue that these rises are a temporary phenomenon.

India seeks it owns path as a manufacturing powerhouse (IHT, June 3)
For a few years now, a facile dichotomy has made the rounds in economic circles: Among developing countries, China means manufacturing and India means services. Yet several leaders of the public and private sector in India see the country's road to riches leading through manufacturing as well.

Manufacturing PMI eases in May (Reuters India, June 1)
Manufacturing activity slowed a fraction in May to its lowest in 10 months, although output and new export orders rose, but input and factory gate prices increased, a survey showed on Monday.

China's Manufacturing Pace Slows on Weaker Exports (Bloomberg News, June 1)
Manufacturing in China, the world's fastest-growing major economy, expanded at a slower pace in May as export growth weakened. The Purchasing Managers' Index fell to 53.3 from a record 59.2 in April, the China Federation of Logistics and Purchasing said today in an e-mailed statement.

Africa: China's Environmental Footprint (All Africa, May 29)
Such South-South cooperation will promote growth and much-needed investment. However, economic growth should not come at the cost of environmental destruction. China has a self-interest in strengthening the rules on the social and environmental impacts of its overseas projects. African governments can learn from China's experience by being selective in the types of investments which they invite, and by making sure that investments do not undermine the long-term environmental foundations of growth and prosperity.

Pricing key to climate change fight (The Times of India, June 3)
Speaking at World Convention on Climate Change at Palampur in Himachal Pradesh, former prime minister of Sweden Dr Ola Ullsten said that the key to long-term environment conservation and sustenance was to examine and incorporate pricing mechanisms for natural resources.

Greenpeace wants environment formula for India (Bombay News, June 3)
Greenpeace, the environmental group, has staged a demonstration in New Delhi urging the Indian Government to come up with a strong climate action plan with accurate timelines.

Foreign Firms Clear Air Over Earthquake Donations (The Economic Observer, June 3)
"The Ministry of Civil Affairs (MCA) is like the father of charity institutions," Wu Huanling, vice-president of AstraZeneca China, explained to her company's headquarters in Britain. She was crestfallen when the latter didn't approve the donation her company had prepared to remit to the Ministry's disaster relief account.

Common-sense yet profound wisdom in 'The New Age of Innovation' (The Los Angeles Times, June 2)
Every so often, a book comes along that demands to be read -- sometimes because of the author's great reputation; in other cases, because the subject is so important. In the case of "The New Age of Innovation," both are true. Professor C.K. Prahalad of the University of Michigan, whose previous books include "Competing for the Future" and "The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid," is sometimes described as one of the most influential thinkers in the world. And the book deals with a pressing issue for managers today: how to compete in a time of rapid and unpredictable change.

Can America keep its innovative edge? (The Economist, June 3)
When trading in the Standard & Poor's (S&P) 500 stock index opened on June 2nd, Bear Stearns was not among the stocks that comprise it. To add insult to the injury caused by its subprime peccadilloes, the crippled 105-year-old investment bank was ejected from the S&P 500 at the close of trading on May 30th following its takeover by JP Morgan.

A dire diagnosis for India's health (The Asia Times Online, May 30)
Despite an impressive economic growth trajectory and a trillion-dollar economy, India still has reasons to worry about the future health of its economy.

Vast distances a barrier to combating HIV/AIDS in India (Reuters India, June 3)
Vast distances are a major hurdle to India's efforts to curb its soaring HIV rate. India, which has the world's third largest HIV-positive caseload, gives drugs for free to HIV/AIDS patients. But doctors say this is not enough to stop the spread of HIV which is making inroads in rural India, especially among women infected by itinerant husbands, and also children.

Children in China quake zone to be vaccinated against epidemics (Xinhua, June 3)
Health authorities will vaccinate children in parts of the northwest Gansu Province in a drive to prevent post-quake epidemics, local authorities said on Tuesday. From June 5 to 19, children aged between eight months and 14 years in several quake-ravaged counties in Longnan City and the Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Gannan will be vaccinated against encephalitis, hepatitis and measles, said a spokesman of the Longnan health bureau.

China has 15 million underage smokers: govt (AFP, June 2)
China said on Monday the country had 15 million underage smokers -- nearly four times the total population of New Zealand -- and the number is rising. Around 40 million of the country's 130 million children aged between 13 and 18 had tried smoking, according to a Health Ministry report on tobacco control emailed to AFP on Monday.

China restores road transport to 97% towns in quake-hit Sichuan (Xinhua, June 3)
China's Ministry of Transport (MOT) announced on Tuesday that 424 towns, almost 97 percent of 439 towns hardest-hit by May 12 quake in Sichuan Province, had restored road links as of 8 a.m. on Monday. Of the 15 towns where highways were still closed, 13 were affected by "quake lakes" formed by the landslides that blocked rivers, said He Jianzhong, spokesman for the ministry.

China to improve coal output, transport (Business Spectator, June 2)
China plans to boost coal output and improve transportation of the fuel, as the peak coal consumption period approaches, the State Council said on its Web site (www.gov.cn).

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