Cape Town organised a three-day India-Africa Entrepreneurship and Investment Summit. The event welcomed Investors, Entrepreneurs along with Private and Public Sector Leaders. It was the sixth edition of the summit sponsored for the first time by the City of Cape Town.
Member of the Mayoral Committee for Economic Growth – Alderman James Vos addressed the delegates and noted that bilateral trade between Africa and India reached a milestone in the 2024-25 financial year. It surpassed US $100 billion nearly double from $56 billion in 2019-2020.
Alderman Vos stated that, yet they are here because they know that this achievement could and should be the first of greater things. He is particularly keen to see Cape Town play a feature role in hitting these milestones. Already, it appears that this is happening as shown by year-on-year growth of Indian exports to the Western Cape, which is up a massive 72% in 2025.
He said that this led to India being second biggest province as import source of the market last year, accounting for 8.4% of the share of imports to the province. It is similarly worth noting that the exports from the province to India grew at an impressive average annual growth rate of 46.37% from 2020 to 2024.
Foreign direct investment from Indian companies have also proved to increase key enablers of jobs and economic growth in Cape Town.
Alderman Vos further stated that between 2015 and 2024, the Western Cape was boosted by 11 FDI projects from India, this counted to a total capex value of US $87.30 million (which roughly counts to R1.4 billion). A staggering 88% of the investments were in the tech services and call centre BPO sectors. Vos further had the pleasure and honour of engaging the leadership of many of these companies and the team and the ones he has helped to facilitate these companies.
According to International Monetary Fund (IMF) projections, India’s GDP will grow by 63.5% by 2031 that will make it the fastest-growing major economy in the world. Alongside this, Indian outbound travel is forecasted to reach 39 million people by 2028. A massive jump was attempted in 2023 as the count of international Indian travellers reached to 28.2 million. Out of those 28.2 million travellers, only 79,774 made their way to South Africa.
James Vos further explained that India’s outbound travel market, expansive consumer base and investors present a massive opportunity for Cape Town’s job creation efforts and economic growth aspirations. Last year, he had the privilege of leading a City of Cape Town delegation to India, where they met with government leaders, tourism operators, airlines and business executives to strengthen the economic relationship.
They discussed opportunities to grow trade, attract more investment, increase tourism and encourage Indian companies to source products and services from Cape Town businesses. A key focus of those engagements was his ambition to see a direct flight between Cape Town and India. While there is still work to be done, they are actively building the partnerships and business case that needed to make a reality. Better connectivity will unlock strategies even greater opportunities for trade, tourism, investment and job creation, is a goal they remain firmly committed to.