Union Minister for Commerce and Industry Shri Piyush Goyal invited Japanese businesses to deepen their investments and partnerships in India during a dinner hosted by the Government of Uttar Pradesh for a Japanese delegation. The event was attended by Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Shri Yogi Adityanath in New Delhi on August 18, 2026.
Minister Goyal highlighted the strategic importance of the India-Japan partnership, noting that bilateral trade reached USD 27.5 billion in FY 2025-26 and that Japan remains India's fifth-largest source of foreign direct investment. He referenced the 16th India-Japan Annual Summit held in July 2026, where Japan set a target of investing 10 trillion yen in India over the next decade, particularly in artificial intelligence, semiconductors, critical minerals, batteries, energy, and next-generation mobility.
Uttar Pradesh was specifically promoted as an investment destination, with the state working toward its ambition of becoming a USD 1 trillion economy under Chief Minister Adityanath's leadership. The state's strengths include more than 9 million MSMEs, making it the fifth-largest state exporter, and key infrastructure projects such as the Jewar International Airport, Yamuna Expressway, and the JICA-supported Western Dedicated Freight Corridor. The state also features 27 industrial clusters in sectors including defence, semiconductors, and electronics.
Existing Japan-India collaboration includes the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High-Speed Rail project, Japanese-assisted metro systems in Delhi, Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, and Chennai, and 11 Japanese industrial townships across eight states. More than 1,400 Japanese companies currently operate in India, including major corporations such as Suzuki, Toyota, Honda, Sony, Hitachi, and Mitsubishi. Enterprises like Escorts Kubota and Seiko Advance are already contributing to Uttar Pradesh's manufacturing ecosystem.
Minister Goyal emphasized India's reform journey in ease of doing business, infrastructure, digital public infrastructure, multimodal logistics, and expanding Japanese language capabilities to create a more enabling environment for investment. He announced his planned visit to Japan from 24 to 27 August 2026 to further strengthen the Special Strategic and Global Partnership between the two countries at the highest levels of government and industry.