India, Japan to cooperate in ICT frontiers of Internet of Things, Big Data

India and Japan have agreed to extend bilateral cooperation in information and communication technology (ICT) to the frontier areas such as Internet of Things (IoT) and Big Data as the two countries explore business synergies.

Highly skilled Indian IT engineers and Japanese entrepreneurs can boost Indian and Japanese companies' creative business activities and promote innovation, the two countries said in a joint statement even as India and Japan signed an action agenda for India-Japan Investment and Trade Promotion and Asia-Pacific Economic Integration

Commerce minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Japanese minister of economy, trade and industry Yoichi Miyazawa signed the action agenda for India-Japan investment and trade promotion and Asia-Pacific economic integration in the capital on Thursday.

Speaking on the occasion, Japanese trade minister Yoichi Miyazawa said the action agenda contains five items that are absolutely integral in furthering the trade relations between India and Japan. According to the Japanese trade minister, the five agenda points included:

• Development of selected townships in India as Japanese industrial townships
• Promotion of investment and infrastructure development
• Further development and cooperation in information technology
• Enhancing cooperation in strategic sectors.Asia-Pacific economic integration

The Japanese minister said that the investments by Japan into Indian companies will double in the next 5 years. He said that signing of this action agenda is a step further in improving the trade relationship between India and Japan as a follow-up of Prime Minister Narendra Modi's visit to Japan last year.

India's commerce minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the signing of action agenda was in line with the prime minister's vision of `Make in India'.

She expressed satisfaction on the progress of trade relationships between India and Japan and said that excellent relations were building up between the two countries which would provide opportunity and potential for people in both the countries as a win-win situation.

She said the interaction with Japanese trade minister involved not only governments but also partnership and dialogue between private sector of the two countries represented by a strong delegation CEOs from both the countries.

The ministry of communication and information technology and Japan's ministry of economy, trade and industry signed separate agreement for cooperation in the field of ICT and electronics. Minister of communication and information technology Ravi Shankar Prasad and Japan's minister of economy, trade and industry Yoichi Miyazawa attended the signing ceremony.