14 IPEF partners sign Supply Chain Agreement in San Francisco

Indian minister for commerce and industry, consumer affairs, food and public distribution, and textiles, Piyush Goyal represented India at the meeting.

IPEF was launched jointly by the United States and other partner countries of the Indo-Pacific region on May 23 last year at Tokyo.

Its 14 partners are Australia, Brunei, Fiji, India, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and the United States.

The framework is structured around four pillars relating to trade (pillar I), supply chains (pillar II), clean economy (pillar III) and fair economy (pillar IV). India had joined Pillars II to IV of IPEF, while it has an observer status in pillar-I.

At this meeting, negotiations under pillar-III, pillar IV and for setting up a ministerial-level council and a commission were substantially concluded, , an official release from the Indian government said.

Under pillar-III, IPEF partners are aiming to advance cooperation on research, development, commercialisation, availability, accessibility and deployment of clean energy and climate-friendly technologies, and facilitate investment towards climate-related projects in the region.

Under pillar-IV, partners aim to strengthen implementation of effective anti-corruption and tax measures to boost commerce, trade and investment among IPEF economies.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (DS)