Bharat SainiLast Updated on October 1, 2017 by Bharat Saini
Asia-Africa Growth Corridor (AAGC) is an economic cooperation agreement between the governments of India and Japan of which vision document was launched on 25 May 2017 at African Development Bank (AfDB) meeting in Gandhinagar, Gujarat. India and Japan are joining hands to develop the Asia-Africa Growth Corridor, a series of infrastructure projects that would enhance trade and well-being in Africa and Asia with the aim to create local ownership of the projects undertaken, not just in a financial sense, but also in terms of local involvement in design, management and execution. Coming together of two poles of Asian power in broad-based solidarity that combines finance and armed strength, high-quality engineering and the ability to deploy it in third countries minus overbearing external benefactors, and projection of a decent counterweight to China’s rising power in the region as it would stand alongside China’s ambitious One Belt-One Road project:
- AAGC vision document aims for Indo-Japanese collaboration to develop quality infrastructure in Africa, complemented by digital connectivity, which would undertake the realization of the idea of creating free and open Indo-Pacific Region.
- AAGC will give priority to development projects in health and pharmaceuticals, agriculture and agro-processing, disaster management and skill enhancement.
- AAGC will essentially be a sea corridor linking Africa with India and other countries of South-East Asia and Oceania by rediscovering ancient sea-routes and creating new sea corridors that will link ports in Jamnagar (Gujarat) with Djibouti in the Gulf of Eden and similarly the ports of Mombasa and Zanzibar will be connected to ports near Madurai; Kolkata will be linked to Sittwe port in Myanmar.
- Connectivity aspects of the AAGC will be supplemented with quality infrastructure.
- Digital connectivity will also support the growth of innovative technology and services between Asia and Africa.
- AAGC would consist of four main components or four pillars that are complementary to promote growth and all round development in both the continents:
- Development and cooperation projects,
- Quality infrastructure and institutional connectivity,
- Capacity and skill enhancement and
- People-to-people partnerships.
- There is scope for Asia to share its experiences of growth and development with Africa, which consists of five remarkable aspects
- Effective mobilization of financial resources;
- Their alignment with socio-economic development and development strategies of partner countries and regions;
- Application of high-quality standards in terms of compliance with international standards established to mitigate environmental and social impact;
- Provision of quality of infrastructure taking into account aspects of economic efficiency and durability, inclusiveness, safety and disaster-resilience, sustainability as well as convenience and amenities; and
- Contribution to the local society and economy.
Japanese firms would find markets for their expertise, high-end engineering products, and services; India’s goodwill as a third world champion from the time of struggles for decolonization to the striving for development would crystallise projects and ease execution. The result would stand as an alternative to aggressive Chinese projects that bring in hordes of Chinese workers and equipment and leave behind a huge financing obligation whose precise contours are yet to crystallise.
