To date, thanks to the economic reforms carried out in the 90s of the XX century, India has entered the top ten countries in the world in terms of a number of indicators of industrial and agricultural production, as well as the creation of information and communication technologies. "Liberalization", "privatization" and "globalization" of the economy were identified as the main directions for improving the national economy of the country. Not surprisingly, India has become one of the most promising Asian partners of the European "economic giant" - Germany.

Liberalization has allowed India to attract investment, develop competition, and provide consumers with a wide range of goods and services. India did not follow the path of massive privatization (except for a short period from 2001 to 2003), but the withdrawal of small blocks of shares from public sector enterprises revealed their real value and made their assets liquid in the market. The trend towards the globalization of economic contacts has allowed Indian companies to enter the global market of goods and services. The goals of these reforms were announced: achieving sustainable economic growth, improving the living conditions of representatives of the least affluent segments of the population, as well as expanding employment.

According to the Central Statistical Organization of India, the current state of the national economy is relatively stable, with a slight decrease in the growth rate (from 3.8% in 2006/2007 fin. up to 2.6% in 2008/2009) and industrial production (from 12% to 9.4% in the same years). At the same time, GDP growth in 2009 was 8.5%, compared with 7-8% in the previous years.¹ The World Bank estimates that India's economy will grow by 7.5% in 2010, while International Monetary Fund economists forecast an even higher growth rate of 7.7%, and 7.8%ⁱⁿ 2011.2.

In order to develop the Indian economy more effectively, the country's leadership, together with scientists, prepared the strategic program "India-2020", which defined the main directions of national economic development in the medium and long term. A special place in the program is given to energy (including nuclear), information technologies, and "strategic sectors" - the military-industrial complex, aerospace research, aircraft construction, electronics, and telecommunications.³

According to a well-known Russian expert, Yurlova, India still lags behind China in many respects, as it spends a lot of effort on maintaining political stability and resolving problems in relations with Pakistan. At the same time, if China is ahead of India on the macroeconomic level, India is developing more dynamically than China on the microeconomic level. In addition, China is inferior to India in the field of information technology development and training of modern programmers.⁴ According to a number of foreign economists, India has developed and created a unique growth model for developing countries, which relies on the export of services rather than goods, as well as on the development of high technologies and the expansion of domestic demand.

The bulk of Indian exports are machinery, equipment, tools and metal products (20.5% of the total export value), petroleum products (17.5%), chemical and pharmaceutical products (14.5%), processed precious stones and finished jewelry (13.5%), as well as agricultural and food products, textiles, computer equipment, jewelry, etc. made of plastic, handicrafts. India mainly imports crude oil and petroleum products (31.5% of imports), machinery and equipment (12.5%), computer equipment and electronics (9%), gold (7.5%), chemical products (7.5%), precious and semi-precious stones (4%), ferrous metal ores (3.5%). as well as ferrous and non-ferrous metals, coking coal, vegetable oils, synthetic rubber and fertilizers ⁵. India's main trading partners include the EU countries (primarily Germany, Great Britain and Belgium), China, the United States, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, and Switzerland.⁶

In 2005 India and Germany celebrate 500th anniversary of German-Indian relations-

international trade relations. The date was also significant in the sense that it is in the last two decades that the countries are experiencing a new round of rapprochement in the trade and economic sphere. Since the beginning of the economic recovery program in India in 1991, trade and economic contacts between the two countries have significantly expanded. Trade turnover increased from 2.7 billion rubles. EUR 13.4 billion in 1991. euro in 2008 India's exports to Germany grew by 11% in the same period, to $ 5.25 billion. euro ⁷.

The first place among Indian exports to Germany is traditionally occupied by textiles, but recently the volume of exports of chemicals, metallurgical, leather, electrical and pharmaceutical products, as well as machinery has increased significantly.

In turn, thanks to the high quality of products and services, as well as accuracy in fulfilling obligations, German companies have earned a high reputation in the Indian market. Currently, Germany is on the 6th place in the list of the largest trading partners of India. From 1990 to 2008, German exports to India increased by 11% to $ 8.15 billion. euro. If in 1990 Germany had a trade surplus of 112 million euros within the framework of German-Indian relations, then in 2008 this figure reached 2.9 billion euros. euro ⁸. Germany supplies India with machinery (1/3 of the total export volume), electrical equipment, aircraft, metal products, control and regulatory equipment (ARC), chemicals, medicines, automobiles and auto parts. It should be noted, however, that India accounts for less than 1% of all German exports.⁹

It should be noted that along with the export of finished products, Germany has been investing in the Indian economy and supplying technology for a long time. Germany is the second largest foreign investor in India with a total investment of $2.7 billion.¹⁰

The Indian-German Chamber of Commerce and Industry (IGTSTP) has assumed the role of coordinator of trade and economic relations between the two countries. Founded in 1956, the organization currently has 7,000 employees; the Chamber is headquartered in Mumbai and has offices in Delhi, Kolkata, Bangalore and Dusseldorf.¹¹

The development of partnership relations in the energy sector remains one of the most important areas of business cooperation between India and Germany. In November 2009, the German Federal Ministry of Economy and Technology hosted the third meeting of the German-Indian Energy Forum in Berlin, which was attended by a large Indian delegation led by the Secretary of State of the Ministry of Energy of India, H. S. Brama. The meeting discussed prospects for implementing joint projects, including modernization of thermal power plants, decentralization of energy supply based on renewable energy sources, improving the efficiency of energy facilities and environmental protection.

India is the sixth largest consumer of electricity in ^the world12. In order to maintain economic growth at the achieved level, the country is interested in large-scale modernization of energy industry enterprises, and Germany is becoming its reliable partner in this area.

According to the IGCCI, Germany ranks 2nd (after the United States) in terms of the number of contracts signed with Indian companies. Among the fields of activity of these companies are chemicals and pharmaceuticals, mechanical engineering and automotive industry, electrical engineering and electronics, production of consumer goods and food products. According to some German businessmen, in India they are primarily attracted by the cheapness of labor (20% of its cost in Germany). The largest number of Indian-German joint ventures is concentrated in Mumbai, Madras and Bangalore.-

German investors are most attracted to these parts of India due to the presence of large numbers of skilled auto workers (50% of car production is concentrated in the south of the country), rapid economic growth (more than 6% per year), ongoing industrial privatization processes, and the presence of transport highways connecting India with other countries Southeast Asia ¹³.

As the world's largest exporter of environmentally friendly technologies and Europe's largest exporter of military equipment, Germany also works closely with India in these areas. The Stockholm Peace Research Institute estimates that India accounts for 7% of German military exports.¹⁴

In recent years, there have been a number of important official meetings between German and Indian heads of State and senior officials. Thus, in April 2006, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh visited Germany ¹⁵ to coincide with the opening of the trade and industrial exhibition in Hanover, in 2007 - the official trip of German Chancellor Angela Merkel to India ¹⁶, and in early February 2010, German President Horst Koehler arrived on a 7-day visit to India where in an interview he stated that "German exporters have great hopes for the dynamically developing markets of India"¹⁷. During the high-level meetings, it was noted that cooperation between the two countries is rapidly developing not only in the economy, but also in science.

The exhibition in Hanover was attended by high-ranking officials, as well as representatives of major industrial and energy companies in Germany and India. Along with trade and economic issues, counter-terrorism and environmental issues were discussed during the meeting, although the most important item on the agenda was cooperation between India and Germany in the field of nuclear research. Prime Minister M. Singh expressed support for the implementation of Germany's peaceful nuclear program. In turn, Chancellor Angela Merkel said that the German government is ready to assist India in the development of peaceful nuclear technologies.

During the official visit of Angela Merkel to India in October-November 2007, she was accompanied by representatives of 30 German companies (including the head of Siemens Corporation Peter Lesher, head of the German joint stock company Deutsche Bank AG/German Railways Hartmut Medorn, head of Deutsche Bank Josef Ackermann, Chairman of the Management Board of BASF Holding (BASF) Jurgen Humbert and others). The program of the German Chancellor's visit to India included talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Minister of Trade and Industry Kamal Nath, during which the parties confirmed their mutual interest in strengthening bilateral trade and economic ties, cooperation in the fields of energy, science, education and culture. They also expressed a desire to increase the annual volume of trade turnover between India and Germany to $²⁰ billion by 201218.

During her 4-day visit, Angela Merkel managed to visit the Indian Financial Center in the country's economic capital Mumbai, where she met with the heads of the country's largest firms and took part in a round table organized by the IGCCI.

Thus, cooperation between the two countries continues to expand, and relations are developing not only through the state line, but also directly between representatives of the business community. Despite the political problems that exist in India, the country is becoming one of the most dynamically developing markets of the XXI century. It was the huge potential of the Indian market and the country's economic growth rate that predetermined the rapid development of German-Indian trade and economic ties even during the global financial and economic crisis.

¹ www.exportsupport.ru/l:ru/foreign/fof-fices/foffice*fofficecity?hl=344762

^{Bondarenko D.} 2 India is overheating // Ekonomicheskie izvestiya, No. 18, 10.02.2010.

³ www.hindustantimes.com/India-2020/Article1 - 221356.aspx

^{Yurlov F. N.} 4 India v mirovoi politike [India in World Politics]. 2005, N 5. P. 16.

⁵ www.exportsupport.ru/foreign/foffices/foffice*fofficecity?h1=344762

⁶ Germany's most important trading partners 2008 - www.destatis.de/jetspeed/portal/cms/Sites/destatis/Internet/EN/Navigation/Statistics/Aussenhand el/Handelspart ner/Handelspartner.psml

⁷ www.new-delhi.diplo.de/Vertretung/newdelhi/en/04/Economic__Relations/S__Economic__Rela tions.html

⁸ Ibid.

⁹ www.new-delhi.diplo.de/Vertretung/newdelhi/en/04/Trade__data/DD__New__Trade_Fig,proper ty-Daten.pdf

¹⁰ www.new-delhi.diplo.de/Vertretung/newdelhi/en/04/Economic__Relations/S__Economic__Rela tions.htm

¹¹ Ibid.

¹² Deutsch-Indisches Energieforum vereinbart weitere Stflrkung der bilateralen Zusammenarbeit. Berlin // Pressebox. 05.11.2009.

¹³ Indian trade links - www.e-turizm.ru/info/227.html

¹⁴ Weitere Steigerung der Rbstungsausgaben // Deutsche Welle. 27.04.2009.

¹⁵ An industrial fair opens in Hanover / / Deutsche Welle. 24.04.2006.

^{Romashenko S.} 16 Merkel intends to increase the volume with India / / Deutsche Welle, 30.10.2007.

^{Yurin V., Temnenkov G.} 17 Germany highly evaluates the prospects for the development of India / / Deutsche Welle. 01.02.2010.

¹⁸ First state visit of Angela Merkel to India / / Rodon Portal. 07.11.2007.

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