Maputo — Mozambique's Minister of Energy, Salvador Namburete, said on Monday that the gradual growth of Indian investment has now put that country among the top ten investors in Mozambique.

Speaking at the opening of a meeting in Maputo billed as the "Conclave on India/Africa Project Partnership 2007", Namburete said "Mozambique has become one of the major African destinations for investment from various parts of the planet".

That included not only mega-projects such as the MOZAL aluminium smelter on the outskirts of Maputo, and the Brazilian investment in coal mining in the western province of Tete, but also a "concerted effort by the government to promote the country's enormous business potential" to "non-traditional" investors in Asia, including India.

Namburete said the government hoped to see further Indian investment in such areas as agriculture, food processing, mining and energy.

"We would like to see Indian involvement in the field of renewable sources of energy", he said. "India has a very advanced experience in this area, in solar energy and in bio-fuels. Its technology is good, simple and easy to use, and that's what we need to fight against poverty".

Namburete pointed out that it was not enough that Mozambique had natural resources - the government had to take a pro-active role in attracting investment, though "a consistent and coherent programme of reforms to ensure macro-economic stability and efficient management in selected priority areas, such as fiscal management, public sector and financial reforms, improving the investment climate and the ongoing reform of the judicial system".

He said the government is taking "further steps to reduce the cost of doing business in Mozambique through decentralisation, streamlining of licensing procedures, addressing the rigidities in the labour market, and improving basic infrastructure, such as energy, roads and telecommunications".

Namburete insisted that the Mozambican government remains committed to the promotion of biofuels "with the aim of responding to the national poverty alleviation agenda, as well as providing a response to high, unpredictable and volatile oil prices on the world markets".

Among the benefits of biofuels was that "they are labour intensive, and can create agricultural and agro-industrial employment, self-employment and income".

Producing biofuels would not threaten food security.

Namburete pointed out that Mozambique has 36 million hectares of arable land of which only nine per cent is in use. Furthermore, the main plant mentioned as a source of Mozambican biofuel, the shrub jatropha, can be grown "on an additional 41.2 million hectares of marginal land, giving people in rural areas the opportunity to generate an income out of land that did not produce anything at all".

For his part, the Indian Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, Anand Sharma, said that agriculture was vital for India's cooperation with Mozambique and other members of SADC (Southern African Development Communitry).

So too was medicine, he added, pointing out that India can supply generic drugs at cheap prices.

"We want to cooperate with these countries and help Africa advance and improve its investment climate", he said.