New Delhi, Nov 5 (KNN) Ambassador of India to France, Jawed Ashraf has said that the strategic relationship between India and France is growing rapidly and the bilateral cooperation has touched across every field of national endeavour, including the defence and security sector.

Addressing the virtual session on France-India Business Forum on Wednesday, Ashraf said, ''It is now evolving from its bilateral context to a regional and multilateral context.''

"Due to the current pandemic, the role of India-France strategic partnership for a stable and secure Indo-Pacific region in a multipolar world order anchored in multilateralism has grown even stronger," he added.

Ashraf also said that for a much stronger economic partnership, we must use this crisis as an opportunity to accelerate the process of economic engagements across sectors of mutual interest between India and France.

"There is great opportunity for nations to reinforce the economic momentum and recovery. The reforms launched in India are structural in nature and not cosmetic. Defence manufacturing will be an area of great opportunity," he added.

Ashraf further stated that we must make the economic partnership a key element not just to bring prosperity in both countries but as an important instrument of our strategic vision.

"We need to have a much higher level of bilateral engagement, both at the government and industry level," he added.

"Various sectors already have a strong presence of French companies in India," noted Ashraf. He further added that the government remained committed to remove the bottlenecks to attract more French investments to India.

Highlighting the investment opportunities for Indian companies, Ashraf said that Indian companies who were earlier focusing on Europe will have to revisit their strategies.

"France with its strategic location, infrastructure, technology, competitive market and the soon to be announced reduction in production taxes will offer huge opportunities for Indian companies to use the country to reach out to other European and North African countries as well," he said.

He further stated that the geopolitics has started to influence the economic choices and trust has become an important factor. Strategies for diversification of supply chain that involve resilience will now be seen.

"Trust and resilience are two important elements in the India-France strategic partnership. Technology will become an instrument of sovereignty of power, competitiveness in future and there will be great opportunities in this sector for both countries," added Ashraf.