Indian VP heads to South America

Huma Siddiqui

New Delhi, May 4

With India attaching importance to its relations with Latin American countries, bilateral trade and investments, and other sectors including space, defence and information technology, will be topping the agenda of Vice President Venkaiah Naidu’s first official trip.

During the weeklong visit starting May 6-11, accompanied by a high-level delegation to including Minister of State for Tribal Affairs Jasvantsinh Sumanbahi Bhabhor, four Members of Parliament and senior officers, Naidu will be visiting Guatemala, Peru & Panama. Besides holding meetings at the highest levels, he will also interact with parliamentarians, visit Universities and meet members of the Indian Diaspora.

"Over the last few years, India's relations with the region, both in terms of political engagement, as well as trade and commercial engagement, has intensified significantly, beginning with the landmark visit of Prime Minister of India (Narendra Modi) to Brazil in July 2014, his meetings with South American leaders there, followed by his visit to Mexico in 2016," according to an official statement from the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

"Bilateral trade with the region has grown steadily. There is potential for further increase," the statement said.

I was the first to report that National Aerospace Research and Development Commission (CONIDA) of Peru have signed a cooperation agreement with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) which will help in training in the interpretation and dissemination of data (satellite images); support the implementation of an astronomical observatory in Moquegua;   and in conducting experiments in the atmosphere / ionosphere sounding rockets.

With bilateral trade between India-Peru touching an all time high of $ 1.57bn, the second round of talks for the trade agreement between the two countries concluded recently in Lima.

Exports to India rebounded by more than 110% in 2017 due to demand for gold and copper. Diplomatic sources said that the sudden spurt in the trade figures is a result of Peru’s increase in export of commodities including Gold, Silver and Copper.

As reported by FE earlier, there has been a lot of interest from Peru for the BrahMos missile and has also sought Bailey bridges from India’s state-run Garden Reach Shipbuilders & Engineers (GRSE), as part of Lima’s drive to diversify infrastructure imports.

Not ruling out future cooperation with ISRO, Guatemala Ambassador to India Giovanni Castillo said that, “ Guatemala has a partnership with Japan, that allow us to put in space the first  Guatemalan satellite in our history, however that does not mean we as a country cannot explore some other Space cooperation that India may offer.”

Looking at Panama as a link to Latin America and Central America, in November 2017, Minister for Commerce & Industry Suresh Prabhu had led a FIEO business delegation to Panama and held a meeting with the President of Panama, Juan Carlos Varela and representatives of various the sectors.