desiman
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Continued - Sorry NY times loves India, the write too much lol
"Manufacturing is no longer done all under one roof," said Victor Fung, the chairman of Li & Fung Group, a large Hong Kong-based company that buys goods from factories across Asia for sale to retailers and wholesalers in the United States and Europe.
Indian officials are talking about expansion. Planning is under way for new wharves at Nhava Sheva, but the years-long task of construction has not yet started.
China has faced capacity problems, too. A surge in steel production in early 2004 overwhelmed Chinese bulk cargo ports. Inflation quintupled in a year, to 5.3 percent, as bottlenecks at ports, highways, railroads and elsewhere in the economy drove up companies' costs.
The Chinese response was swift and decisive. The pace of port investment nearly tripled in six months. Work crews labored around the clock to erect more cranes and expand wharves.
The Chinese economy grew at a breathtaking pace of 11.3 percent in the second quarter of this year, but consumer prices were just 1 percent higher in July than a year earlier.
By contrast, India is struggling with 8 percent inflation this summer as bottlenecks have appeared after three years of 8 percent growth.
Belatedly, India's roads and ports are improving. Just four years ago, Sona Koyo Steering Systems, an auto parts manufacturer, incurred hefty financing costs to keep a month's inventory on hand in case deliveries were delayed. Now the company's factory in Gurgaon makes six deliveries a day to a nearby Maruti car assembly plant; the eight-mile drive takes an hour or more because of constant traffic jams, but the deliveries get through.
"I'm not going to deny infrastructure is bad," said Surinder Kapur, Sona's chairman and managing director. "But a lot of our vendors are around us, a lot of our customers are close to us."
India is also starting to address chronic power shortages. But it is still a serious problem in northern India, where Mr. Kapur's steering systems factory is located. He receives electricity from the national grid just seven or eight hours a day. So the factory has three enormous diesel generators, one bigger than a typical Manhattan living room, operating at four times what an industrial user in the United States usually pays.
Despite such obstacles, India's manufacturing sector appears poised for further growth. In a country where the national symbol has shifted from government bureaucrats at aging desks to call center operators in cubicles, the next icon looks like it will be the laptop-toting engineer on a factory floor.
"The old philosophy was, 'I should work in an office, come in at 10 and leave at 4,'" said Nitin Kulkarni, 35, an engineer at the Hazira steel mill. But in recent years, he added, "there has been a revolution."
"Manufacturing is no longer done all under one roof," said Victor Fung, the chairman of Li & Fung Group, a large Hong Kong-based company that buys goods from factories across Asia for sale to retailers and wholesalers in the United States and Europe.
Indian officials are talking about expansion. Planning is under way for new wharves at Nhava Sheva, but the years-long task of construction has not yet started.
China has faced capacity problems, too. A surge in steel production in early 2004 overwhelmed Chinese bulk cargo ports. Inflation quintupled in a year, to 5.3 percent, as bottlenecks at ports, highways, railroads and elsewhere in the economy drove up companies' costs.
The Chinese response was swift and decisive. The pace of port investment nearly tripled in six months. Work crews labored around the clock to erect more cranes and expand wharves.
The Chinese economy grew at a breathtaking pace of 11.3 percent in the second quarter of this year, but consumer prices were just 1 percent higher in July than a year earlier.
By contrast, India is struggling with 8 percent inflation this summer as bottlenecks have appeared after three years of 8 percent growth.
Belatedly, India's roads and ports are improving. Just four years ago, Sona Koyo Steering Systems, an auto parts manufacturer, incurred hefty financing costs to keep a month's inventory on hand in case deliveries were delayed. Now the company's factory in Gurgaon makes six deliveries a day to a nearby Maruti car assembly plant; the eight-mile drive takes an hour or more because of constant traffic jams, but the deliveries get through.
"I'm not going to deny infrastructure is bad," said Surinder Kapur, Sona's chairman and managing director. "But a lot of our vendors are around us, a lot of our customers are close to us."
India is also starting to address chronic power shortages. But it is still a serious problem in northern India, where Mr. Kapur's steering systems factory is located. He receives electricity from the national grid just seven or eight hours a day. So the factory has three enormous diesel generators, one bigger than a typical Manhattan living room, operating at four times what an industrial user in the United States usually pays.
Despite such obstacles, India's manufacturing sector appears poised for further growth. In a country where the national symbol has shifted from government bureaucrats at aging desks to call center operators in cubicles, the next icon looks like it will be the laptop-toting engineer on a factory floor.
"The old philosophy was, 'I should work in an office, come in at 10 and leave at 4,'" said Nitin Kulkarni, 35, an engineer at the Hazira steel mill. But in recent years, he added, "there has been a revolution."
