Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan to open Global Investors Meet in Kochi on Friday

Thiruvananthapuram: A two-day Invest Kerala Global Summit 2025 (IKGS 2025) aimed at attracting both domestic and foreign investments across key sectors of the state, set to begin at Kochi on Friday.

Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan will inaugurate the event at the Lulu International Convention Centre in Bolgatty, Kochi. The prominent speakers at the inaugural session include union ministers Nitin Gadkari, Piyush Goyal and Jayant Chaudhary, UAE Minister of Economy Abdulla bin Touk Al Marri and Bahrain Minister of Commerce and Industry Abdulla bin Adel Fakhro.

Around 3000 delegates including global industry leaders, planners, policymakers, entrepreneurs and prospective investors are expected to attend the summit. It will feature country-specific sessions that will highlight investment opportunities in Germany, Vietnam, Norway, the UAE, France and Malaysia.

Additionally, diplomats from 26 countries and ministerial committees from three countries will participate in the event. Ten departments have prepared projects based on the Public Private Partnership (PPP) model.

Kerala industries minister P Rajeev said the summit aims to ensure that the business proposals presented during the meet are transformed into actual projects. Officials will provide information regarding various stages of completion for the projects generated at the summit.

With the chief minister, ministers and top bureaucrats taking part in the summit, the administrative capital will shift base from Thiruvananthapuram to Kochi for the next two days.

The government also got a major boost for the event with the opposition Congress-led UDF agreeing to take part in the summit.

At a time when the UDF is at war with the state government over its industrial policy, the presence of opposition leader V D Satheeshan and deputy leader P K Kunhalikutty of the Muslim Leader will help the government to send out a positive message to the prospective investors.

The participation of prominent industrialist M A Yusuf Ali who is also Vice Chairman of Norka Roots. CII President Sanjiv Puri and MD of Adani Ports and SEZ Ltd Karan Adani and NITI Aayog former CEO and G20 Sherpa Amitabh Kant have added heft to the summit.

The IKGS will also have 29 special sessions along with an exhibition featuring over 100 enterprises, reflecting the focus sectors and panel discussions at the summit, It will also showcase Kerala's industrial success stories.

Speaking about the positive industrial environment in the state, industry minister Rajeev said the other day that the state had already emerged as a software development hub for global IT companies. With a Center for software technology coming up in Thiruvananthapuram, the state will facilitate the setting up of units by global automotive companies like Nissan and BMW.

The minister revealed Kerala government's plan to set up campus industrial parks to offer skills and vocational training to students. As many as ten companies are all set for making announcements on this front, the minister said and added that 31 private industrial parks have already been approved.

Rajeev said as many as 20 laws have been amended to facilitate the development of industries in the state during the past eight years. Kerala has also emerged as a major hub for medical devices and allied industries with the state accounting for 24 percent of the country's total medical device turnover and more than 12 percent of the world's blood bag production.