Rome: Union Minister of Commerce and Industry Piyush Goyal met Italian Minister for Enterprises Adolfo Urso on Thursday and discussed a range of issues of mutual interest. Goyal was accompanied by senior officials and a high-level business delegation led by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), while Minister Urso was accompanied by his Deputy Minister Valentino Valentini and other senior officials.

Both ministers highlighted the elevation of bilateral relations to a strategic partnership during the recent visit of the Prime Minister of Italy, Giorgia Meloni to India. Goyal highlighted India's inspirational growth story comprising youth power, digitization, and financial inclusion of the 140 billion population with aspirations.

He also underscored India's achievement in clean energy to deal with climate change impact and emphasised that India has achieved 40 per cent of its installed capacity of energy from renewable in 2021 and set an ambitious goal of generation of 500 GW by 2030.

He mentioned that the Government of India, under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the Make in India initiative to make India a manufacturing hub for quality products having zero effects and zero defects. He expressed that India aspires to grow manifold from the present USD 3.5 trillion economy to become a developed country in the next 25 years by 2047.

Goyal also briefed Minister Urso about India's capital investment of USD 1.4 trillion under the national infrastructure pipeline to build world-class infrastructure. Both ministers acknowledged the complementarities and synergies between Make in India and Made in Italy initiatives and encouraged business communities of India and Italy to invest in each other's market and exchange on technology and innovation.

Minister Urso said that both countries should strive to forge partnerships in space, defence, IT, energy and agriculture. He said that India and the EU should have a fair, equitable, and free trade agreement.

Goyal extended an invitation to Minister Urso to visit India.

A Business delegation led by CII also met Minister Urso and his colleagues and had a fruitful interaction. Both Ministers emphasized more collaboration and cooperation to tap the huge potential of the two large economies.

In the evening, Goyal met the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Infrastructure and Sustainable Mobility, the Government of Italy Matteo Salvini. Both sides highlighted the need to promote investments in the field of sustainable mobility.

Goyal pitched for enhancing Italian investments in the fields of dedicated freight corridors, ports, airports, and high-speed railway lines while underscoring the Government of India's flagship initiatives, PM GatiShakti and National Infrastructure Pipeline.

He mentioned about the USD 1.4 trillion outlay kept for building infrastructure in India. On the sustainability issue, Goyal underlined the government's commitment to building its capacity in renewable energy in order to have a more sustainable and low-carbon economy. Deputy PM Salvini expressed a desire to visit India to view massive progress in infrastructure development.

He also shared about the flagship project of building the world's longest suspension bridge to connect Sicily with the mainland. Goyal said that culture, cuisine, languages, and films play an important role in boosting people-to-people contact and they are the key drivers in promoting soft power diplomacy between the two countries.

During his two-day-long stay in Rome, Goyal had meetings and interactions with two Deputy PMs, Tajani and Salvin, a cabinet minister, Urso, three Deputy Ministers, Cirielli, Silli and Valentini, Vice President of the Italian Senate, Sen. Gaspari, President of India-Italy Friendship Group, \Sen Terzi, eight Parliamentarians and almost hundred Chairmen, MDs, CEOs and Heads of business and trade associations from diverse sectors. Engagements also included one-on-one meetings with Heads and CEOs of eight top Italian companies.