India is to get 15 billion dollars in FDI, which is three times higher than last year's figure, according to Commerce and Industry Minister Kamal Nath.

Nath, who returned from World Economic Forum meeting in Davos recently, told reporters here on Thursday that as much as five billion dollars in FDI are expected to flow in from South Korea alone.

Even though it had been started to set the target of ten billion dollar in FDI some years ago, India got 5.6 billion dollars in 2003-04.

A sizeable chunk of the projected FDI is likely to come through infrastructure sector, Nath said adding, "infrastructure financing is a major area where long-term funds are being committed."

Pharmaceutical, biotechnology and information technology are some other sectors that have come on the radars of foreign investors, he added.

Nath, who led a 60-member Indian business delegation to Davos, said multinational chief executive officers and several foreign pharmaceutical companies evinced keen interest in investing in India particularly in research and development in the wake of new patent regime introduced in January this year.

He pointed out that drugs worth $60 billion would be off the patent regime in the next three years offering huge opportunities against growing domestic demand and exports. "In fact, pharmaceutical can very well replicate the success story of Indian information technology."

According to the minister, Merc, a pharmaceutical company which had left India, has already indicated that it would set up its research division in India.

Nath's hope of attracting higher FDI comes in the backdrop of the Indian government's decision to lift the ceiling on FDI in the telecom sector from 49 to 74 percent. The government had earlier hiked FDI cap in civil aviation from 40 to 49 percent and proposed a FDI hike from 26 to 49 percent in insurance sector.

Foreign Institutional In~estment in India has already touched nine billion dollar mark this year.

Commerce ministry officials said most foreign in~estors of late xrefer India to China because of "over-exposure" fear to China. While 77 percent of foreign investors make money in India, 20 percent succeed to do the same in China, they said.

Nath said India has offered to host a meeting of "Group of 20" coalition of WTO members in March this year to firm up a strategy in the run up to the ministerial meeting in Hong Kong in December this year.