December 09, 2006	Saturday	Ziqa'ad 17, 1427

DUBAI, Dec 8: Some six million Indian expatriates in the six oil-rich Gulf Arab states will send home this year around $20 billion in remittances, a United Arab Emirates official said in remarks published on Friday.

Economy Minister Sheikha Lubna al-Qassemi was speaking at a meeting of Arab and Indian businessmen in Dubai attended by India's minister of commerce and industry, Kamal Nath, the daily Emirates on Friday reported.

It quoted Nath as saying Indians' remittances from the UAE alone would reach $6 billion this year, and that India could easily get an additional $2 billion in investment from Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states.

India needs as much as $150 billion in foreign direct investment in the next seven to eight years, while the UAE and other Gulf states are looking at lucrative places to invest in, Qassemi told the gathering.

India, which gets most of its oil from the Gulf, is negotiating a free trade agreement with GCC members Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

GCC Secretary General Abdul Rahman al-Attiyah said in March that a free trade pact would boost the volume of trade between the two sides from an estimated $12.8 billion in 2005 to $15 billion in coming years. —AFP