Soft Power To Strategic Presence: Why India Is Giving A Renewed Push To Ties With Latin America

Latin America and The Caribbean region had remained out of sight for long, but its relations with India have gained traction since the beginning of this century and a new thrust in recent years.

Latin America may be on the other side of the globe, but not out of sight from the heights of Raisina Hills. This is evident from the fact that External Affairs Minister Dr S Jaishankar visited four Latin American countries in a row this year — Guyana, Panama, Colombia and the Dominican Republic. The nine-day visit in April was his first as EAM in Latin America and the Caribbean this year. He had last year travelled to three Latin America and The Caribbean (LAC) members: Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay.

It would not be wrong to say that this region had remained out of sight in the corridors of South Block for long, but has gained traction since the beginning of this century and a new thrust in recent years. These efforts are yielding results and according to the EAM, Indian businesses have till now invested over USD 15 billion in the LAC region. Though India-LAC bilateral trade grew to USD 40 billion in 2022 from USD 29 billion in 2018, but compared to China (USD 482 billion in 2022), the Indian-LAC trade is far behind.

Perhaps, the distance and the transport cost of exportable goods to the small and big countries of the region factored prominently for the Ministry of External Affairs mandarins, and hence the lesser push to the Indian business community to register their footprint, and the lesser diplomatic presence so far. The MEA is now taking care of this. To increase the footprint in LAC countries, India organises an India-LAC conclave supported by the Ministry of External Affairs. This year also, the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) hosted a three-day India-LAC business conclave in early August, in which 11 LAC countries were represented and the conclave was inaugurated by Jaishankar.

There are 33 countries in ‘Latin America and Caribbean’, which include Mexico and the countries from Central America, South America and the Caribbean islands , with a rough population of over 650 million. As China has projected its Belt and Road Initiative as a key platform for expanding its influence and connectivity in the region, China’s strategic link to the region is mainly based on promoting its economic interests and hence China intends to develop strategic partnership with the region by engaging in infrastructure and energy linkages.

India, meanwhile, has a natural bonding and convergence of interests on key global issues with Latin America and Caribbean countries, India is banking on its soft power like culture, heritage, philosophy ,yoga, ayurveda, films etc , which is very popular because of large number of people of Indian origin who populate mostly the Caribbean region. India used to treat LAC as the last frontiers of its foreign policy, but in fast changing geo-political equations, India needs to expand its influence in the region with greater focus, make visible economic presence and enhance people to people exchanges, which will build a bridge between India and LAC.

India Has The Potential To Enter Latin America And The Caribbean Market

To showcase India in a better manner, India needs to open it’s mission in all of 33 LAC members, but presently 17 of the countries do not have Indian missions. Missions have a significant role in strengthening trade and economic relations and promoting the country's political interests especially in garnering support in UN for India sponsored resolutions. The missions also have a role in better explaining India’s views on global and regional issues. They also have a role in supporting Indian companies wanting to enter the LAC region, with catalogues and policies of the host governments.

To develop a deeper interaction with the Latin American region, India has to deal with four major players — CARICOM (Caribbean community), SICA (Central American Integration system), SELA (Latin American Economic System) and the Permanent Secretariat of the General Agreement on Central American Economic Integration (SIECA). The four are the founding observers in the Association of Caribbean States.

CARICOM or the Caribbean Community comprises 15 member states Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent, and ‘Trinidad and Tobago’ and one dependency.

Some of these are cricket-playing countries, and hence well known in India. But Indians are not very familiar with the intricacies of these groupings, which are actually heavily populated with the people of Indian origin — around 2.5 million. They want to reconnect with their ancestral lands. Their emotional bond towards India needs to be exploited for developing deeper people-to-people connect that will help in transforming better bilateral diplomatic relations. Of late, the geopolitical significance of these small island states has increased tremendously, as they not only form a strong collective vote bank in the United Nations, they can be tapped for increasing diplomatic clout in the UN. India has received significant support from LAC for the Permanent seat in the United Nations Security Council. The group of LAC also supports India on many issues in the United Nations.

Most Latin American countries are not involved in any major conflict, and hence there is not much requirement for defence products. But small arms and light helicopters are in demand to control criminal activities. Large countries like Brazil have made good progress in high-end products like small passenger aircraft, but mostly dependent on imports for other arms. India has imported Embraer aircraft from Brazil for converting them to early warning aircraft. India has been able to make an entry in the defence sector in LAC, but not in a big way. Ecuador had purchased four Advanced Light Helicopters almost a decade and a half ago in 2008, but its image was dented due to some crashes. Ecuador cancelled export orders for seven more ALH in 2015.

Due to the prevalence of drug mafia in Latin American countries, they need air assets to deal with them in the dense forests. Of late, these countries have reduced their defence business with the US due to tough competition from China. But India has the potential to enter the market with its niche defence products like night vision glasses, cyber security, patrol vessels, body armour etc. Indian manufacturers specialising in security equipment and technology have good potential in increasing their footprint in the LAC markets. To mark its defence footprint in the region, India has been undertaking military exercises with Brazil, Chile and Peru.

China is a competition for India too. But though it faces formidable challenges from the Dragon nation, it is gradually breaking the barriers. According to Jaishankar, "India is successfully implementing projects in the region to develop critical infrastructure, including in power transmission. There have been some notable contracts in roads, oil and gas, renewable energy, and are now seeing beginnings of defence.” These are positive trends and are expected to take India-LAC relations to newer heights in future.

The author is a senior journalist and strategic affairs analyst.

[Disclaimer: The opinions, beliefs, and views expressed by the various authors and forum participants on this website are personal.]