'India endorses concept of creating reliable supply chain in Indo-Pacific'

Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal on Tuesday said that India 'wholeheartedly' endorses the broad concept of working towards ensuring a trustworthy, dependable and reliable supply chain in the Indo-Pacific region.

Speaking at the Australia-India-Japan Ministers' meeting on 'Supply Chains Resilience' held via videoconference, he said the diversification of the supply chain is critical for managing the risks associated with the supply of inputs including disciplining price volatility.

"We could provide the core pathway for linking value chains in the region by creating a network of reliable long term supplies and appropriate capacities," Goyal said.

The meet was held in the backdrop of the Covid-19 crisis and the recent global-scale changes in the economic and technological landscape.

It was attended by Australia's Minister for Trade, Tourism and Investment, Senator Simon Birmingham, and Japan's Minister of Economy, Trade and Industry, Kajiyama Hiroshi.

The Ministers' underscored the necessity and potential to enhance the resiliency of supply chains in the Indo-Pacific region.

Recognising the pressing need for regional cooperation on supply chain resilience in the Indo-Pacific, the ministers shared their intention to work towards the launch of a new initiative to achieve the objective through cooperation.

Addressing the trilateral meet, Goyal said that the initiative also dwells on improving the competitiveness of sectors.

"For this, we may need to identify the manufacturing and services sectors which contribute most to the domestic value addition in the region," Goyal said.

"We support the need for specific activities listed for enhancing the resilience of the supply chains which include those related to promotion and facilitating trade and investment as well as diversification of production base."

He said that the digitisation of trade procedures is a very important step for facilitating trade and thereby maintaining resilience in supply chains.