With Donald Trump threatening new prices and China about to flood the world markets with cheap exports, Zoho founder Sridhar Vembu, has expressed a striking warning: “We will be faced with a Chinese product attack … Navigate as a huge challenge.”
In a grade of seven points published on X, Vembu presented what he calls a survival plan for India in the middle of a world of fracturing. From food and energy autonomy to factory sprints and rupee trade, its message is urgent: India must act decisively – not just to protect itself, but drive where others can wave.
1. Food safety passes first
“Fortunately, India is self-sufficient in food and we have to protect our food security,” he said. But self -sufficiency is not enough. While the poorer nations are faced with increasing stress, India, he says, must grow more to help those who slip into food crises. “It’s our Dharma as Bharat.”
He underlines the diplomacy of the country’s vaccines during the cocvid as proof of what this awareness can accomplish.
2. Link of energy to food – and becomes durable
“Energy is food,” notes vembu, stressing how modern agriculture depends on fertilizers and machines derived from fossil fuels. While India currently benefits from healthy links with expanding countries of oil, it calls for long -term investments in sustainable agriculture.
This means R&D in water management, cattle and plant ecosystems, electrical propulsion agricultural machines – and in a critical way, farms of private models and training centers.
3. Brace for the overcapacity shock of China
China, he warns, does not engage in commercial assault out of force, but “despair in the face of massive overcapacity”. The result? A global overabundance of everything, from steel to electric vehicles.
He suggests a counter-back:
“Negotiation to pay Chinese imports in rupees can be a good starting point … which can also push their companies to buy from us.”
More broadly, the renegotiation of reimbursements of external debt in rupees could stimulate the call for export of India. “The world will probably be more receptive now,” he adds.
4. A sprint from 3 to 5 years to build factories
“We need a sprint of 3 to 5 years to build factories everywhere,” writes Vembu. Importers and distributors of foreign products must be pushed to manufacture locally, government incentives softening the quarter work.
Its proposal: allow full first -year radiation for factories implemented in backward districts and a radiation of 50% elsewhere to accelerate investments.
5. import equipment, not consumer goods
India should prioritize the machines and import equipment that allow production, not consumer goods of the end user. “And negotiate to pay for these equipment in rupees,” he adds-restoring his wider thrust for a local lever effect in the trade.
6. Make private R&D the next revolution
India must increase its R & D-GDP ratio to 3% over the next 5 to 10 years, mainly driven by the private sector. VEMBU suggests a “CSR type obligation” to finance R&D, as well as rapid radiation for capital expenses related to R&D.
7. Share knowledge, don’t haunt it
While India is investing in innovation, it must also raise others, exhort vembu. “They do not have the vast human resources to invent that we do,” he wrote.
“When we start to invent, we must share rather than hoarding. It is the only way to a fairer and more stable world order. It is our dharma as Bharat. “
