News / India could be the new 'superpower of manufacturing', but...

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“Best practice” advice to shippers considering shifting sourcing is to consider India, but ‘do your homework’, warned Daniel Krassenstein, global supply chain director at Procon Pacific.  

In DHL’s 2025 Trade Atlas, India “stands out” as the country with the third-largest predicted trade growth, from 2024 to 2029, according to factors including speed and scale. 

The forwarder predicted India would see 6% of additional global trade across the five years, behind China’s 12% and the United States at 10%.  

Further, its import and export trade value in 2024 was $1.1trn – a figure projected by DHL to increase 7.2% by 2029.  

Sanyukta Kulkarni, senior route development manager of Indian subcontinent, for DB Schenker, told The Loadstar: “India’s story today is similar to China’s between 1990 and 2010.” 

And at last week’s TPM25 by S&P Global, Mr Krassenstein, whose firm imports bulk bags, advised shippers what to consider when eyeing a production move to India – something one major US shipper told The Loadstar on the sidelines of the event they were “really interested in at the moment”.  

Mr Krassenstein calculated that a typical American factory worker earned some $3,000-$4,000 a month, in China the wage was around $1,200 a month, and in India, roughly $300.  

“That’s a big differential,” he said. “But it’s not that simple, you have to look at productivity as well as cost.

“For one sewing worker in China, you need two to two-and-a-half workers in India to make the same quantity of product. And a lot of it has to do with automation, modern equipment, training, and middle level management. China is far advanced in terms of productivity, India is not there yet,” he explained. 

Based on this productivity differential, Mr Krassenstein concluded that every $10 spent in China equated to $6-$6.50 in India, for his product.  

“But the reality is, bringing it into the United States under Trump tariffs, it’s about 200% more expensive to buy out of China, versus India. 

“Do we still manufacture in China? Absolutely. Not for the US market, but for the Japanese and Canadian markets. The quality is excellent, lead times are predictable; there’s very little fluctuation in variables, and nobody’s playing games with you. They’re very mature companies.

“In India, I’m dealing with variables every day.” 

He also advised those sourcing in India to “put in a lot of buffer for production and time delays”.  

“That means you need to keep more inventory in the US or elsewhere, alternative sources.”  

Further, he recommended Whatsapp as the best form of communication with Indian suppliers, versus WeChat to deal with those in China.  

“India and China don’t play well together. But we found ways around that. A great program is Smartsheet – it’s a shared document platform like Google Docs, but it doesn’t require a VPN, so both my India and China offices can use it, which is very handy.” 

Mr Krassenstein broke India down into geographical clusters, explaining “if you’re going to do business in India, depending on your industry, figure out where the clusters are”. 

He urged shippers to consider the infrastructure, rail, highways, efficiency of nearby ports, manufacturing costs, and standards, weather, public holidays, and transport services to your importing countries.  

“India is do-able, but it takes a lot of work,” Mr Krassenstein concluded. “Picture a triangle – cost, time, quality. Something’s got to give. It’s very difficult to get a bullseye.” 

And Ms Kulkarni added that if India continued its efforts on improving its manufacturing capabilities and reducing bureaucracy and roadblocks, “then becoming the next big superpower of manufacturing will be a reality, rather than just a dream.”  

“For India, the time is now,” she urged.