India proposes funding for small, medium-scale businesses in Caricom
GEORGETOWN, Guyana, (CMC) – India’s Minister of External Affairs, Dr Subrahmanyam Jaishankar who is currently on a four-day official visit to Guyana says he is focused on intensifying his country’s ties with Caribbean Community (Caricom) member states.
Jaishankar began his engagements with an extensive meeting with Caricom at the 4th Caricom-India Ministerial Meeting which was co-chaired by Jamaica’s Foreign Minister, Kamina Johnson Smith. The meeting was held at the Caricom headquarters in Guyana.
The meeting of foreign ministers has been seen as another meaningful step towards institutionalising the high-level engagements between India and Caricom nations.
It follows the establishment of the Caricom-India Joint Commission in 2015, the resumption of ministerial meetings, and the first Caricom-India Summit-Level Meeting in 2019.
These engagements have given impetus to the relationship and provided policy guidance for future Caricom-India interactions and are seen as another step towards strengthening relations.
During the meeting, officials also discussed how the strategic partnership can advance the Region’s priorities, such as climate change, agriculture and energy.
The solidarity and support from India are seen to contribute towards regional integration objectives including agriculture, ICT, climate change and disaster risk management.
In addition, the ministers also discussed the wide-ranging sectoral cooperation, including in trade and economy; agriculture and food security; health and pharma; energy and renewables; infrastructure, ICT and eGovernance; development partnership and capacity building; higher education; culture and P2P domains.
They also exchanged views on vital issues of climate change and disaster resilience; counter terrorism; reformed multilateralism and closer cooperation at multilateral forums. Additionally, they agreed on follow-up steps, including holding the second Joint Commission Meeting this year.
Jaishankar went on to underline the pressing global issues, including COVID-19, climate events, debt and trade stress, and food and energy security during the meeting.
India, which currently chairs the G20, is keen on supporting countries not on the table through the ‘Voice of Global South’ process, he added.
In addition, the External Minister put forward a proposal for small and medium-scale enterprises in the Caribbean and suggested supporting individual projects of up to a value of a million dollars on a grant basis and creating a partner group in India to provide machinery, technology, and training.
“What we’d like to do is to create a partner group in India and see whether our capability will include the supply of machinery, technology, training – if we can get really viable project offers from your side, we would be very happy to look at that,” Jaishankar said.