{"id":8050,"date":"2020-10-05T08:36:23","date_gmt":"2020-10-05T13:36:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cf.iisd.net\/itn\/?p=8050"},"modified":"2024-08-09T18:31:12","modified_gmt":"2024-08-09T16:31:12","slug":"india-moves-to-restrict-foreign-investment-from-its-neighbours-and-bans-dozens-of-chinese-apps","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/2020\/10\/05\/india-moves-to-restrict-foreign-investment-from-its-neighbours-and-bans-dozens-of-chinese-apps\/","title":{"rendered":"India moves to restrict foreign investment from its neighbours and bans dozens of Chinese apps"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The government of India has recently enacted significant restrictions on inward <span class='tooltipsall tooltipsincontent classtoolTips68'>FDI<\/span> coming from its neighbours, in a move that seems calculated to target Chinese investment.<\/p>\n<p>According to a <a href=\"https:\/\/pib.gov.in\/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=1615711\">press release<\/a> issued by the Ministry of Commerce and Industry on April 18 2020,\u00a0 new restrictions have been placed on investment coming from any country which shares a land border with India \u2013 namely Afghanistan, Bangladesh,\u00a0 Bhutan, China, Myanmar, Nepal and Pakistan\u2013 and has been enacted to curb \u201copportunistic takeovers\/acquisitions of Indian companies due to the current COVID-19 pandemic.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Prior to this recent change, under India\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.gibsondunn.com\/new-foreign-investment-restrictions-imposed-by-india\/#:~:text=The%20Revised%20Rules%20came%20into,by%20an%20Affected%20Investor%2C%20or\">investment laws<\/a> most inward investment did not require government approval. Approval, was however, required for FDI in sensitive sectors such as telecom, defence and railway infrastructure, and any investment from Bangladesh or Pakistan.\u00a0 Now those restrictions have been extended to any FDI from any of India\u2019s neighbours.<\/p>\n<p>Over the last twenty years, <a href=\"https:\/\/dipp.gov.in\/sites\/default\/files\/FDI_Factsheet_December-19_5March2020.pdf\">99 per cent<\/a> of the investment India received from its neighbours was Chinese. However, Chinese investment has increasingly met with political push-back, particularly in the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/content\/b1df5dfd-36c4-49e6-bc56-506bf3ca3444\">tech sector<\/a>, and while Amazon has also faced political difficulties, these recent moves <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2020\/08\/25\/business\/amazon-hyderabad-india.html\">seem to favour<\/a> US over Chinese tech companies. <a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2020\/04\/18\/to-avoid-hostile-takeovers-amid-covid-19-india-mandates-approvals-on-chinese-investments\/\">According<\/a> to some observers, the move to restrict FDI from India\u2019s neighbours is aimed primarily at China.<\/p>\n<p>Indeed, this is not the only restriction India has placed on Chinese economic activity recently \u2013 on June 29 2020 the government banned TikTok and 58 other apps from Chinese developers, <a href=\"https:\/\/techcrunch.com\/2020\/06\/29\/india-bans-tiktok-dozens-of-other-chinese-apps\/\">reportedly<\/a> citing national security concerns.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-alibaba-india-investment-exclusive\/exclusive-alibaba-puts-india-investment-plan-on-hold-amid-china-tensions-sources-say-idUSKBN25M200\">Reportedly<\/a> in response to political tensions between the two countries, Chinese tech-giant Alibaba has recently announced that it will halt investment into India<!--more--><\/p>\n<script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips67','Energy Charter Treaty'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips68','foreign direct investment'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips76','multilateral investment court'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips104','responsabilit\u00e9 sociale des entreprises'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips106','asociaci\u00f3n p\u00fablica-privada'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips114','Sistema de Tribunales de Inversiones'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips116','European Commission'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips117','European Union'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips118','Union europ\u00e9enne'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips119','Uni\u00f3n Europea'); <\/script>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The government of India has recently enacted significant restrictions on inward <span class='tooltipsall tooltipsincontent classtoolTips68'>FDI<\/span> coming from its neighbours, in a move that seems calculated to target Chinese investment.<script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips68','foreign direct investment'); <\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\"> toolTips('.classtoolTips116','European Commission'); <\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15869,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[397],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8050","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8050","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8050"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8050\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15869"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8050"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8050"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.iisd.org\/itn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8050"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}