Bob Hiensch in Calcutta on Wednesday. Picture by Kishor Roy Chowdhury

Calcutta, Oct. 14: The Netherlands is set to open a trade office in the city by December end.

“We have approached the Netherlands commerce ministry and the local government here for opening a business support office in Calcutta. The legal process is expected to be over in a month,” Bob Hiensch, Netherlands’ ambassador to India, said here today.

At present, the Netherlands has 40 trade offices, globally, and two of them are in India.

“Our offices in Chennai and Ahmedabad are the most successful ones. The third office in India will be in Calcutta and we also have plans to open another in Hyderabad,” the ambassador said.

Hiensch, who met state commerce and industries secretary Sabyasachi Sen today, said they had “fruitful” discussions; Sen had assured him all assistance in opening the office.

Hiensch and Sen also discussed possibilities of collaboration in sectors such as agriculture, food processing, floriculture, petrochemicals, water storage and vocational training.

“These are the sectors where we have the expertise which the state (Bengal) needs,” Hiensch said.

The ambassador said the Netherlands hoped to cross the $10-billion-mark in bilateral trade with India by 2013.