India, New Zealand Discuss UPI System's Facilitation, Tech Cooperation In Joint Meeting

India and New Zealand on Thursday discussed the facilitation of a Unified Payment Interface (UPI) system, carbon credit, trans-shipment hub, technological collaboration and cooperation in work visa and banking.

The first round table joint meeting was co-chaired by the Additional Secretary, Department of Commerce, Rajesh Agarwal and the High Commissioner of New Zealand in India, David Pine. 

Looking at the present quantum of bilateral trade between the two countries, both sides in the meeting acknowledged the huge potential in India and New Zealand partnership and the need for bringing in synergy for enhanced economic relations in areas of mutual interest. 

The Ministry of Commerce and Industry in a statement said that the discussions also focused on taking forward the objectives of the Joint Trade Committee (JTC), formed under the bilateral trade agreement of 1986.

The New Zealand High Commissioner emphasised on collective efforts keeping in mind the principles of mutual benefits, proportionality, facilitating trade and association with private sectors.  

Pine also informed that the India New Zealand business council has brought out a report in April 2023 on “India New Zealand –Relationship ready for next phase”, reflecting feasible areas of cooperative activities for economic prosperity. 

He also emphasised increasing the air connectivity links between the two countries.

Agarwal mentioned about strengthening the existing institutional mechanism for improving bilateral trade and emphasized on creation of a structure for working on cooperation and collaboration issues. 

"This could include establishing a working group at the joint secretary level to work on specific identified issues and once the ideas and the corresponding cooperative activities are concretized, the same can be scaled up and finalized during the joint trade committee meeting," he stated.

Agarwal further stated that it would require a concerted effort from both sides and should take into account deliberations at G2G, B2B and G2B interactions. 

The industry and industry associations from the New Zealand side, while calling it a significant moment in the economic relationship between the two countries, emphasised the need to speed up the activities and continue the dialogue in a more structured way like the present one.

Both sides were unanimous on the need for having more government-to-industry dialogues for concrete mutual benefits, the ministry added in the statement.