India, Japan ink 10 pacts, cover areas like space, agriculture

Tokyo: India and Japan on Friday signed 10 pacts covering a range of areas such as boosting Japanese investment in infrastructure, railways, and for cooperation in space and agriculture, as part of agreements to bolster bilateral ties.

An MoU was signed between the National Investment and Infrastructure Fund Limited and Japan Overseas Infrastructure Investment Corporation for Transport and Urban Development to enable cooperation and promote investment in infrastructure projects in railways & transportation; port terminals; toll roads; airport terminals and urban development.

"This MoU would also enable the two sides to explore opportunities to set up a NIIF-JOIN joint fund," the Ministry of External Affairs said in a statement.

Two memorandum of understandings were signed to boost cooperation in space technology. One of the MoUs between Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) concerned cooperation in outer space in satellite navigation and planetary exploration.

It also included joint missions and joint use of ground systems for mutual support.

The other MoU between India's Ministry of Earth Sciences and the Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science aims to promote cooperation in areas of joint survey and research, and exchange of scientific visits by researchers and experts.

India and Japan also signed a landmark deal for civil nuclear cooperation after talks between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his counterpart Shinzo Abe. The move is likely to boost bilateral economic and security ties and facilitate US-based players to set up atomic plants in India.

The deal allows Japan to export nuclear technology to India, making it the first non-NPT signatory to have such a deal with Tokyo. It cements bilateral economic and security ties as the two nations warm up to counter an assertive China.

In past two years, India received about USD 55 billion in foreign direct investments, which, Modi has said during this visit, is "not only the highest ever FDI but also highest growth in FDI in India".

Another fixture from the deals signed was cooperation in the agriculture sector.

The two countries signed a Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) to deepen bilateral cooperation in agriculture and food industries - that includes food value chain networking and protecting Geographical Indication (GI) of agriculture products.

GI is a sign used on products that have a specific geographical origin and possess qualities or a reputation that are due to that origin.

The MoC, a framework document, would provide for specific agreements between concerned agencies between both sides.

The two countries will also cooperate in the area of skill development. An MoC signed in this regard "envisages training 30,000 Indian youth in the Japanese-styled manufacturing in the next 10 years," according to the statement.

Programmes under this MoC would contribute to 'Make in India' and 'Skill India'.

Another agreement was aimed at improving the quality of Indian textiles "for conformity assessment" for Japanese market, the statement said.

Two pacts were signed to promote bilateral cooperation in the field of art and culture, and in sports ahead of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics for training of coaches and athletes.

The 10th pact was signed between the state of Gujarat and Japan's Hyogo Prefectural Government to promote cooperation between them in the fields of academics, business, culture, disaster management and environmental protection.