City to host Indian Ocean Rim countries meeting

Bangalore will host the 11th council of ministers’ meeting of the Indian Ocean Rim Association for Regional Cooperation (IOR-ARC) on November 9-15. The meeting will focus on promoting trade and investment among the 18-member countries, a senior official said.

“As India will assume the chair of the association for the next two years, external affairs minister S M Krishna will chair the meeting that will focus on promoting economic and technical cooperation, including expansion of trade and investment among member countries,” P S Raghavan, additional secretary, ministry of external affairs told reporters here.

Yemen held the chair of the IOR-ARC for two years from 2009. The association, in which India is a founding member, was set up in Mauritius in 1997 with Australia, Bangladesh, Indonesia, Iran, Kenya, Madagascar, Malaysia, Mauritius, Mozambique, Oman, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Thailand, United Arab Emirates and Yemen as the member-countries.

It has also five dialogue partners - Egypt, Japan, China, Britain and France and two observers - Indian Ocean Tourism Organisation (IOTO) and Indian Ocean Research Group (IORG). As part of the event representatives of Indian Ocean Rim Business Forum, Indian Ocean Rim Working Group on Trade and Investment, Indian Ocean Rim Academic Group and the Committee of Senior Officials (CSO) will meet to draft reports on the regional cooperation initiatives. The foreign ministers or senior cabinet ministers of Australia Bangladesh, Kenya, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Mauritius, Mozambique, Singapore, South Africa and Tanzania will be participating in the meeting along with senior officials from member countries. It will also consider and adopt the recommendation of CSO on the agreement and draft statute of the regional centre for science and transfer of technology, which is located at Tehran in Iran.

The foreign ministers will review the status on the launch and operationalisation of the Oman-based Maritime Transport Council and discuss the tourism study conducted by IOTO, Raghavan said.

“The meeting will adopt a ‘Bangalore Declaration’ and hold brain-storming sessions on enhancing cooperation among the member countries in tourism, culture, education, skill development, fisheries, small-and-medium enterprises (SMEs), infrastructure, maritime transport cooperation and combating natural disasters,” he added.