Indian banks operational in Mauritius seeing good growth in business

MUMBAI: The Indian and foreign banks functioning in Mauritius have been witnessing strong growth in business since the Indian firms are eyeing expansion of operations in Africa.

Mauritius is gaining prominence among the larger global financial centres like London and Singapore, due to its position as a gateway to Africa.
As per Standard Chartered Bank data, in the past two years, trade between India and Africa has reached $40 billion and is likely to surge to $70 billion by the year 2015.

Mr Sridhar Nagarajan, Chief Executive Officer, Standard Chartered Bank Mauritius, said, “London, with its inward-looking legislation, is crowding out companies. Most of the latest regulations by its banking commission are extremely protectionism-oriented. Because of this change, Mauritius is becoming more relevant.”

The overall offshore banking business that flows via Mauritius is almost $150 billion.

Traditionally, Mauritius has been considered as a sugar-cane centre, meeting the demands of European nations.

But in the past few years, this conception is fast changing to a more advanced business centre mainly for banking and offshore business.
Both, Bank of Baroda and StanChart meet the requirements of the local population and also provide offshore banking services to the Indian and other corporates aiming to foray into Africa.