Countries look to boost development

The timing of the first China-India Strategic Economic Dialogue held in Beijing on Sept 26 and 27 was significant for several reasons. The first was the adverse economic outlook for Europe. With the international community working hard to solve Europe's debt crisis, there was speculation over whether China and India, the two largest emerging markets, would examine how the crisis affected their prospects. The speculation became stronger as the dialogue took place soon after the BRICS countries met and proposed buying euro bonds for mitigating Europe's debt problems.

In the end, however, the dialogue focused purely on bilateral economic issues. The two sides discussed a variety of subjects including energy, environment, water management and railways. All of these are important development priorities for both sides and it is heartening that they decided to focus on specific issues for sharing mutual experiences and considering possible future cooperation.

Energy efficiency was expected to feature, given the increasing demand in both countries and the lack of adequate energy reserves for meeting these demands. There are two aspects to the discussion on energy: The first is improving energy efficiency and the second is making energy consumption less carbon-intensive. In both areas, China and India have much to learn from each other. World history points to a strong positive correlation between economic growth and energy in the development trajectories of countries until they develop appropriate technologies for conservation and optimum use of energy. Similarly, a greater use of energy is expected to increase carbon emissions unless cleaner fuels are used. Both countries are now in the process of experimenting with technologies and using less carbon-intensive fuels, and would have had much to share in this regard.