Nitesh Narayan Rane to address FICCI’s Maritime India Conference & Expo.

VMPL
Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], October 30: Nitesh Narayan Rane, Maharashtra’s Minister of Fisheries and Ports Development, will address the inaugural session of FICCI’s fourth Maritime India Conference & Expo, which opens at the Bombay Exhibition Centre on Monday.
The event, running from 2 to 4 November, will bring together policymakers, port authorities, shipping lines, shipbuilders, and investors as India seeks to establish itself as a global maritime hub. It is organised with support from the Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways under the theme “India as a Global Maritime Hub: Trade, Transformation & Sustainable Growth”.
The event has grown substantially since last year. More than 10,000 business visitors have already registered, and FICCI is targeting 16,000, up from 7,200 at the previous edition. Exhibition space has expanded to 10,000 sq m, about 40 per cent more than in 2025, and more than 150 companies will exhibit, 92 per cent of them from the private sector.
Karnataka, Odisha, Goa and Maharashtra are partner states, with their state maritime boards participating. Mumbai Port Authority, Paradip Port Authority, V.O. Chidambaram Port Authority and Deendayal Port Authority are partner ports, and the Inland Waterways Authority of India (IWAI) is the institutional partner.
The Netherlands, the partner country, will host a dedicated pavilion. Delegations from Italy, Norway and Singapore will attend, with the Italian delegation led by Mr Marco Consalvo, president of the Port of Trieste and Monfalcone. Companies and institutions from the UAE, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, France, Japan and Switzerland will also take part.
Minister Shri Rane will be joined at the inaugural session by Mr Vijay Sankar, President-elect of FICCI and chairman of the Sanmar Group; Mr Dhruv Kotak, chair of the FICCI Committee on Ports & Shipping and managing director of JM Baxi; Mr Nabil Taouati, consul general of the Netherlands in Mumbai; Mr Binesh Kumar Tyagi, chairman and managing director of the Shipping Corporation of India; Mr Sushil Kumar Singh, chairperson of the Indian Ports Association; Mr Shyam Jagannathan, Director General of Shipping; and Mr Sushil Kumar Lohani, chairman of IWAI.
Four FICCI knowledge reports will be released during the session: a FICCI-PwC report, “Smart & Future-Ready Ports”; a FICCI-A.T. Kearney report, “Trade, Logistics and Global Connectivity: Hinterland Connectivity, Modal Shift and Cargo Evacuation”; a FICCI-EY report, “Optimising India’s Shipbuilding and Ship Repair Capacity: Roadmap for Industrial Scale-Up”; and a FICCI-CRISIL report on domestic container manufacturing in India.
Seven plenary sessions will cover smart ports, trade and connectivity, logistics, shipbuilding, green shipping, inland waterways and cruise tourism, and maritime investment and security. Participants include global carriers and operators such as MSC, CMA CGM, Maersk, Hapag-Lloyd, DP World and PSA, alongside leading private port groups, shipbuilders Cochin Shipyard, Mazagon Dock, GRSE and Titagarh, energy companies BPCL, ONGC and Indian Oil, and financial institutions including Exim Bank, NIIF and IFSCA. Invite-only roundtables for chief executives and diplomats will run in parallel on the opening day.
More than 2,000 business-to-business and business-to-government meetings will match port operators, shipping lines and technology providers with potential partners. State sessions and roundtables on dredging, multimodal connectivity and shipbuilding policy will bring government and industry to the same table.
The programme is aligned with Maritime India Vision 2030, which sets out more than 300 initiatives for the sector. Recommendations from the sessions and reports will be submitted to the government, giving industry direct input into policy on ports, shipbuilding, logistics and sustainable shipping.
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