India and Australia have been major political players in the Indo Pacific region but they have had a historically lukewarm relationship, in terms of trade and diplomacy. According to some foreign policy white papers released by the government of Australia, Canberra seeks to strengthen its ties with Delhi through trade and commerce. The white papers are a set of recommendations, which outline what the Australian plans to do in the near future with regards to its foreign policy.
The white papers contain around ninety recommendations in making India a strategic partner in the Indo Pacific region by 2035. The most prioritised sector seems to be higher education. This does not come as a surprise as Indians already consider Australia to be one of the favourable higher education destinations. Moreover, Australia also provides two-year work permits for students having completed their studies there. Can berra will try to take this further by setting up a higher education hub in India and even having an Australian consortium partnering a new IIT in India. Suchan investment makes logical sense when one understands that education is Australia’s third largest export.
The White Papers further suggest that Australia should support Indian membership in the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC). APEC is a 21 member organisation which supports free trade all across the Asia Pacific region. Australia probably hopes to champion the Indian cause in the APEC to get a free trade agreement (FTA) with India in the longer run. This would not only strength then Australia’s ties with India, but also thwart Chinese hegemony over the Asia Pacific region.
With a growing Indian economy, an FTA could boost commodity export from Australia. Amongst the commodities to look at for Australia would be LPG. Australia is also endowed with a multitude of natural resources, which they can use to establish sound trading relations. The white paper does identify the servicing and IT sector of India to be of key interest. It will be logical if Australia uses this sector to build the political bridge with India. Australia does plan to make India a top ODI destination for Australia and since one of the major sectors attracting ODI from foreign countries is the IT sector, this underlines the probability of Canberra leveraging its political strength through the Indian IT sector.
But as of today, there is too much speculation about the concrete nature of the trade between these two countries. The white papers are policy recommendations that have targets to be fulfilled by 2035. Although it might be too early to make concrete statements about the nature of the relationship between the two countries, we can all be sure that Australia has forgone its earlier mistrust of India and is signalling to be one of our closes economic and politicalally.
India Outbound
October 15,2018
source https://indiaoutbound.org/australias-new-political-and-economic-ally-india/
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