The giant Indian car manufacturer, the Tata Company has been invited to use Mauritius as its operations base to manufacture and sell its cars on the African market, the Mauritius Prime Minister Navin Chandra Ramgoolam disclosed here Saturday.

Meeting the press on Saturday at his office in Treasury House, in the capital Port Louis, the Prime Minister told journalists that during his visit to India this week to attend the Indian Diaspora Summit, he met with some of the most prominent Indian industrialists in order to urge them to establish part of their business in Mauritius.

During his talks with Ratan Tata, the Chief Executive Officer of the Tata Group, Ramgoolam said he stressed that Mauritius has the technical knowhow to house a factory for the manufacture of the Tata Nano, dubbed the People’s car, which has just been introduced to the world press on Thursday last

Mauritius is acting as a bridge between the African mainland and Asia, the Prime Minister said, adding that he told Ratan Tata that the manufacture of such a car as the Tata Nano will not only create jobs in Mauritius but will give an opportunity to the lower stratum of society here and in Africa to own a car. At US$2500, the Tata Nano is presently the cheapest car on the world market.

Ramgoolam indicated that he also met with Naresh Doyal, CEO of Jet Airways, who he said is interested in exploiting theIndia-Mauritius-South Africa air route in partnership with Air Mauritius and South African Airways.

He said Jet Airways has already cornered 48% of the Indian internal air travel market and flies to New York, Toronto, Kuala Lumpur, London and other international airports, but would like to open one line at the initial stage to serve the African continent and use Mauritius as its African hub.

SR/daj/APA 13-01-2008 © APA news