How India is Driving the International Higher Education Market: A Strategic Expedition for Developed World?

Background

According to its ministry of commerce India’s merchandise export in 2021-22 (April-January) was USD 335.44 billion, an increase of 46.53% over USD 228.9 billion in 2020-21 and an increase of 27.0% over pre Covid figures of USD 264.13 billion.

Further, IMF data shows India recorded a continuous GDP growth over 6% and even above the GDP growth rate of China which was around 5% in 2023. This trend will lead India to double their economy to a $ 6.7 trillion just within an eight years and per capita GDP increased to $4,500 by 2031.

Source IMF

With this remarkable growth, India’s middle class is expected to grow from 432 million people in 2020-21 to?715 million in 2030?with 47 per cent increase and India's projected population for 2047 is 1.66 billion.

This even shows that one out of every three Indian will be in the middle class. This growth potential and its opportunities coupled with geo-strategic importance in the Asia Pacific puts India under the spotlight. This is visible through the new political and security alliances such as QUAD, AUKUS, and other current Indo-Pacific foreign policy strategies of the western democratic nations. The education sector also has become centre of focus in these developments due to its high relevance since culture and education is seen as more acceptable and subtle way to influence power and strengthen power within likeminded nations.

According to forecasts Asia Pacific leads the world on middle class population and continue to extend their gap between Europe, Latin America, and Africa. By 2030 Asia Pacific will account for 3,492 million middle class population. Out of this 3,492 million 715 million alone will be from India. ?This indicates 20.50 per cent of the total middle-class population in Asia Pacific.

In 2022, around 750,000 Indian students moved to overseas countries for tertiary educational purposes. This is a significant increase compared to 450,000 mobile students in 2017. Even India surpassed China for both US and UK as the top student sending country. The top four preferred countries for Indian students are USA (190, 512) Canada (185,955) UK (132,709) and Australia (59,044). Out of overall 6.1 million mobile students in the world in India’s share is almost 12 per cent. These figures indicate the depth and power of Indian market and the competition among countries to attract Indian students. In the current knowledge-based economy, high skilled talents are key in driving the economic prosperity and growth and most of the leading developed countries are dependent on India in this domain. The following sections highlights some of the key partnerships and mutual initiatives between India and some G7 countries in developing better relationships with India to strengthen student mobility, labour migration, research and innovation leading to geo strategic advantages.

Strategic Pursuit

USA

India’s education market is a very important aspect to US higher education strategy. US focused its engagement with India through ?iCET framework. The iCET expect to strengthen space cooperation including innovative approaches for the commercial sectors of the two countries to collaborate and initiate new STEM talent exchanges which would cover space science, earth science and human spaceflight. The joint task force for STEM talent being established between the Association of American Universities and leading Indian educational institutions to recommend research and university partnerships for students and young tech professionals. American universities are starting special programmes for Indian students in STEM fields from fall semester 2024. This will support to build capacity of individuals and institutions in emerging tech areas to research, produce and?collaborate.

UK

On the other hand United Kingdom is also focusing on improving its educational collaboration with India through their international higher education strategy ?listing India as a priority country/market. According to UK’s Higher Education Statistical Agency in 2023 there were 173,190 Indian students reached UK for higher education purposes showing a 39 per cent growth compared to previous year. ?India and UK established a ‘Mutual Recognition for Qualifications’ between two countries under India- UK road map 2030 specially focusing on education, research, innovation and enterprise. This MRQ process covers qualifications generally used to access higher education such as level 3 qualifications regulated through qualifications framework of England and Northern Ireland. It is believed that this process covers 80 per cent of courses which Indian students chooses to study in UK. ?However, professional qualifications such as medicine, engineering, nursing, and other areas are excluded from this agreement.

France

France has a strong educational ties with India. In 2018 France and India signed an agreement on Mutual Recognition of Academic Qualifications. Following signing the agreement Indian qualifications are recognised by France authorities. These includes all India senior school certificate examination (AISSCE) (CBSE, state boards, pre-university or any equivalent qualification is recognized by the Government of India) and bachelor’s degree, master’s degrees, and PhDs.

Recently France announced its fiver year Schengen visa scheme for Indian Alumni. The goal of this scheme is to allow 30,000 students come to come to France from India aiming at fostering academic excellence, boosting cultural links, and enhancing long-lasting friendship between the two nations by 2030. Under the new programme, France plans to offer a five-year Schengen circulation visa for Indian alumni. Indian students who hold a master's degree or above and have spent at least a semester studying in France are eligible for a five-year short-stay Schengen visa.

Compared to US and UK student market size in India, France share is relatively smaller at the end of 2022. According to estimates of the External Affairs Ministry of India at the end of 2022, only 10,003 Indian students were studying in France.

Germany

In 2022, India and Germany signed a comprehensive mobility and migration agreement which is the first such agreement for Germany with an any country in the world. This was aiming at facilitating two-way mobility of students, professional and researchers and it will also cover both legal migration and cooperation on the return of migrants. The intent also includes supporting each other’s efforts to expand the internationalisation of their higher education systems, to further inter-link the innovation and research landscapes of both countries and to strengthen dual structures for vocational education and training.

Australia

Following Germany, almost a year later in May 2023, Australia signed a similar student mobility partnership arrangement called Australia-India Migration and Mobility Partnership Arrangement with India aiming to promote the two-way mobility of students, graduates, academic researchers, and businesspeople, while also enhancing cooperation to prevent irregular migration and people smuggling. A new?centre is established for Australia-India relations, aims to bring both governments together with industry, academia, and the community. After USA, Australia is the most preferred destination for Indian students with over 100,000 students reaching Australia by the end of 2022 as per Indian government estimates. ?

Finally,

The refinement of France and Germany’s policies towards Indian students may create a challenges to well established actors like US, UK, and Australia. In long term India focus visa schemes and other mobility partnerships could easily increase the student outflows towards France, Germany, and also for Australia from India. These developments clearly showcase the importance of Indian students in global student mobility and how the future of global student mobility is shaping up.

From the perspective of UK and US higher education, the growing ties between India and other western countries and their willingness to compete for Indian market, institutions, and partnerships indicates future scenarios. The opportunities for educational development and other forms of cooperation between India and the developed world evolving at a rapid pace while India is trying to attract more students from developing world.

At the bottom line the declining skilled talents in receiving countries has created a bigger demand for Indian skills. The young demography of India with?64% of its population?in the working-age is an extremely attractive prospect for western countries including US, UK, Germany, France, and Australia. Geo-politically India is a major access to Pacific and Global South which is important for the collective West in countering China’s growing influence both economically and politically.