Dip in bilateral trade with Austria in 2012

Chennai, Jan 23 (PTI) Trade volume between Austria and India shrunk in 2012 compared to the previous year due to the prevailing economic crisis in Europe, a senior diplomat said today.
"The bilateral trade relations in 2011 stood at 1.4 billion euros. Exports from Austria constituted 800 million and from India to Austria it was 600 million. But last year, Austrian exports to India declined by 20 per cent due to the (economic) crisis...", Austrian Trade Commissioner to India, Wolfram Moritz said at a conference organised by Madras Chamber of Commerce here.
"Last year, the trade volume slipped to 1.2 billion euros compared to 1.4 billion euros registered in the previous year," he said.
However, he hoped that the bilateral trade should pick up later this year. "I am very confident it will be growing this year...", he said.
The trade between the two countries is spread across several sectors including infrastructure, railway, water technology, food processing among others.
On his first visit to Chennai, Moritz said this year Austria would also focus on agricultural products.
"This year, I am planning to focus on consumer goods, lifestyle products, beverages and harvesting. I think, there is a bottleneck here in the agriculture sector", he said.
To a query, he said about 120 Austrian companies are present in India.
He said the number of Indian tourists visiting Austria was growing year-on-year, and last year it recorded a 45 per cent jump to reach 80,000 Indians visiting his country. Tourism constitutes 10 per cent of Austria''s total GDP, he said.
To a query on Austrian trade with China, he said it was six times bigger compared to India and last year it recorded eight billion euros.