Singapore and India have committed to collaborate in a variety of new sectors, including food and energy security, green technology, and digital connectivity, Singapore's Deputy Prime Minister Lawrence Wong announced on Tuesday (Sep 20).
After a five-day visit to India, he told reporters that the inaugural India-Singapore Ministerial Roundtable may serve as a framework for regular meetings and the coordination of new areas of engagement in the future.
Mr. Wong, who is also the Minister of Finance, stated that Singapore and India have been discussing ways to expand their connection, but the COVID-19 outbreak has put many of these plans on hold for the past two and a half years.
"As the COVID situation improved in both of our countries, we were able to restart conversations," he added, adding that both nations ultimately agreed to convene a new high-level ministerial roundtable as a means of enhancing collaboration.
"Therefore, I was thrilled to be able to travel here this time to inaugurate the roundtable and meet with my peers.
"We had candid, in-depth conversations on a vast array of topics, and we agreed on numerous new areas of cooperation, including food and energy security, green technologies, notably green hydrogen, digital connection, and skill development," he added.
Mr. Wong remarked that Singapore and India possess "complementary capabilities" in a number of domains.
Using financial technology (fintech) as an illustration, he highlighted India as having "great promise" due to its digitisation efforts and "explosive development" in the start-up arena.
Additionally, Singapore has been expanding its fintech sector. Mr. Wong stated that despite Singapore's "far lower market size," the country serves the greater area as a financial hub.
The new agreement struck over the weekend by the Monetary Authority of Singapore and the International Financial Services Centres Authority of India would provide a boost to fintech collaboration between the two countries.
"They may experiment, test, and develop through regulatory sandboxes in both Gift City (Gujarat International Finance Tec-City) and Singapore, and possibly expand their solutions in both countries," he added.
Mr. Wong also hoped that the high-level ministerial roundtable, which was organized for the first time during his visit, would become an annual event in the future.
"We want the ministerial roundtable to be a permanent arrangement where ministers from both sides meet regularly," he continued, while he emphasized that the gathering will have a "flexible" structure that can adjust to changing requirements and requests.
Comments