BIMSTEC Agriculture Meet

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GS 2: Bilateral, regional and global groupings and agreements involving India and/or affecting India’s interests.

India hosted the 8th Meeting of Agriculture Experts of Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation(BIMSTEC) Countries.

Trilochan Mohapatra, Secretary (DARE) & DG (Indian Council of Agriculture Research)
chaired the meeting.
Thanda Kyi, Deputy Director General, Department of Planning, Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation, Republic of the Union of Myanmar Co-Chaired the meeting.

The agricultural experts at the BIMSTEC agriculture meet have favoured deepening the cooperation in the agriculture sector for food and nutritional security in the region.
The chairman of the BIMSTEC agriculture meet highlighted The UN Food System Summit – 2021 and the transformations happening in the agriculture and food systems globally.
The chairman urged for enhancing the engagement and deepening the cooperation in agriculture and allied sectors amongst the BIMSTEC Member States.
- It is possible by encouraging exchange of knowledge, germplasm, students and experts, etc., along with the trade of technologies for developing resilient agriculture, food systems and value-chains.
The countries, at the BIMSTEC agriculture meet, applauded India’s offering of 6 slots of scholarships each for Masters and Ph. D. Programmes in Agriculture and its other initiatives for capacity development and training including development of seed sectors.

The BIMSTEC was founded in 1997 to provides a unique link between the South and South-East Asia with 5 countries – Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka from South Asia and two countries – Myanmar and Thailand from the South-East Asia.
The countries came together one platform for cooperation in 14 key economic and social sectors of the economy.
BIMSTEC headquarters at Kathmandu, Nepal.
17^th BIMSTEC summit was held in Sri Lanka in April 2021.
BIMSTEC new Secretary General: Tenzin Lekphell.
Objective: To pursue mutual trade, connectivity and cultural, technical and economic development in the region.
Initially, six sectors- trade, technology, energy, transport, tourism and fisheries were included for sectoral cooperation which was later expanded to 14 areas of cooperation.
Agriculture is one of the 14 sectors. Around 22 per cent of the global population live in BIMSTEC countries and agriculture & allied activities are central to the economic and social development of the region.