00:00First, Prime Minister mentioned UPI and it can help Ghana.
00:05Is there any chance that we can have a linking of that with both countries' finance and services?
00:13And also, Prime Minister mentioned the fact that Ghana actually said that about Balgam attack
00:22and actually spoken about against terrorism.
00:25So, if there is any chance of working together with Ghana and neighbour countries in counter-terrorism sphere.
00:35We have… Please, sir.
00:38Sir, my name is Aloka. I am from Akashwani.
00:42My question is, what has been discussed on the vaccine diplomacy today?
00:49And how can Bharat help Ghana in this country and what has been discussed on the vaccine?
00:57And what has been discussed on the vaccine?
00:59What has been discussed on that?
01:02Any more questions this side?
01:06Okay. Here, please. Please, there is a mic there.
01:11Hi. I am Juliet Ethica with the Business and Financial Times.
01:17Of all the areas of cooperation you mentioned, you mentioned cooperation in critical minerals.
01:23And Ghana has a lot of critical minerals.
01:25So, if there are specific minerals, this collaboration we will be looking at.
01:33So, you can take those questions.
01:35We will come back for more questions.
01:36Let me first clarify to you that the importance of cooperation, collaboration between India and Ghana
01:57also has to be seen in the context of the global south countries coming together.
02:02And South-South cooperation, the solutions to be found by the countries of the global south
02:09by way of sharing the expertise, know-how, and doing collaborations.
02:14And that is very important for us to understand.
02:16The visit of the prime minister to be seen in that context, in the larger context of the global south.
02:22Now, on the UPI, the question whether, how the linkages will help.
02:27Now, let's understand this, the unified payment interface was a successful initiative in India.
02:37Ghana, too, is quite advanced in the way they are thinking in introducing the systems.
02:43The Pan-African payment gateways is what Ghana is already looking at.
02:47But expert level discussion should have to evolve further.
02:54I think we have to expect the discussions to continue for some more time because these are technical issues.
03:00And the recognition of the technology and being able to align the technologies is very important.
03:07I think we will get into details about these linkages subsequently.
03:11But this potential is enormous for both India and Africa to link through Ghana.
03:20I will not further elaborate it, we will let the experts speak subsequently.
03:27Now, working together in counter-terrorism, yes, as I said in my opening remarks itself,
03:36there is concern on both sides.
03:39Ghana, too, is facing the problem of instability in the Sahel region and there is a fear that it might spill into Ghana.
03:49And the piracy on the sea coast is another concern.
03:53So, it wants to protect.
03:55And cooperation with India is important for its own sovereignty and to be able to secure its borders.
04:03Now, this is a global concern.
04:05Terrorism is a global concern for all countries.
04:08In that sense, there is a broad understanding on the need to condemn terrorism wherever and whenever it happens.
04:15And there can be no let up in that, in the action, the global action and the commitment towards it.
04:22So, defense cooperation will lead to that in tackling because there are, once the defense dialogues takes place at a regular intervals,
04:34these issues will come up.
04:35We are already training the Ghanaian defense officials and personnel, specifically in India for their,
04:49in how they understand terrorism to counter-terrorism within, in Ghana itself.
04:56So, that cooperation is active and it is now expanding further into the area of equipment sourcing from India.
05:05On the vaccine hub, well, aapne joo sawaal poucha hai vaccine ke baare mein,
05:12toh, vise toh, yehaan paar joo system hai, already India se export ho ra hai, yehaan ka.
05:17Lekin, President Mahama ka joo interest hai ki, yehaan paar fill and finish concept, manufacturing facilities agar,
05:26haam yaan paar chalou kare hai,
05:28siraf ghana ke liye nahi hai, lekin West Africa ko joo market ke expand ker sakti hai,
05:35haamara footprint vahaan bada sakti hai.
05:37Toh, yeh haamara joo entrepreneurs already trading kare hai,
05:41medicines or pharma or vaccines, yehaan ka set up karne se,
05:48aur unka jo bhal milega aur market expansion ka opportunity bhi milega.
05:55Toh, yeh unka thinking and in the larger context of engaging India in the pharma and vaccine space,
06:03I think this is a very good opening, this is a gateway
06:07and we should encourage our entrepreneurs to be able to take advantage
06:12of what President Mahama is offering in terms of collaborations in the pharma area.
06:19This has become an important priority for all the countries around the world,
06:23particularly in Africa post-COVID, and we see that as an opportunity.
06:28In terms of, madam, you talked about critical minerals in specific,
06:33but I think this needs a bit more exploration because Ghana, as we know,
06:37is endowed with very rich minerals.
06:40And that the world knows, which is why it is called as the Gold Coast.
06:44And there are other minerals which are yet to be explored.
06:49And the President Mahama has clearly mentioned that Ghana has several critical minerals
06:54still to be explored and exploited.
06:57And he has offered Indian expertise and entrepreneurship to come
07:02and be able to precisely do collaborations here.
07:07So we know that there are many possibilities here.
07:11It requires a study.
07:13It requires exploration.
07:15And then exploitation is, it follows from there.
07:19Thank you very much.
07:20Okay, thank you.
07:22My name is James Samu Jr.
07:24Please.
07:25Please, please.
07:26Go ahead.
07:27Go ahead.
07:28Yes.
07:29I work with the Ghana News Agency.
07:30As we all are aware, trade volumes between India and Ghana reached over 3 billion US dollars.
07:40And as we may also be aware, Ghana has been, you know, touted as the citadel of trade now in Africa, so to say,
07:51with the Africa continental free trade area, you know, situated here.
07:57How is India hoping to leverage AFTA to boost trade but also to increase the trade volumes?
08:05Mm-hmm.
08:06Please.
08:07Mm-hmm.
08:09My name is Nima Amar.
08:11I write for the High Street Journal.
08:14I write for the High Street Journal.
08:17In your conversation about the setting up of plans, you know, the president launched the 24-hour economic policy,
08:26which is expected to run the country one way or the other 24 hours.
08:33And ministers, some ministers, even the president himself, the chief of staff, have been to other countries like China to engage investors.
08:43In terms of timeframe, can you give us a timeframe whereby we can see more of the Indian community drooping into Ghana
08:55and enforcing the collaboration in the terms of setting up of plants and all that?
09:01Question there, please.
09:03Good evening.
09:04My name is Blesa Suga.
09:05I'm a broadcast journalist with the Multimedia Group.
09:08I have a question on BRICS.
09:11Two years ago, the former president, Nanak Nakwaku Fado, espoused the idea that Ghana may be at the doorstep of BRICS,
09:20asking for membership, just as many other West African countries.
09:24President Mahama, during his inaugural speech, also appears to be following that line,
09:31adding that BRICS appears to be creating a new world order.
09:37Will India open its arms in the form of the kind of leadership that we've seen over the years,
09:42that you've played on that multilateral platform in accepting countries such as Ghana as members?
09:49Then also, this will be the Prime Minister's second visit to West Africa this year.
09:56Is West Africa becoming the new destination for Indian investment?
10:03Do you have a question?
10:06Good evening.
10:10My name is Simano.
10:12I write for the Daily Graphic newspaper.
10:15I want to find out, with the cooperation that has been signed between Ghana and India,
10:22I want to know how much of investment, monetarily, if that calculation has been done,
10:30is going into this cooperation between Ghana and India on the part of India?
10:36And what will the Indian government also be getting from Ghana with this cooperation?
10:43What India is going to get?
10:46Yes.
10:47What's the investment coming from?
10:49We have a question there?
10:50Yes.
10:51My name is Mabel from GBC.
10:53In all that you've mentioned, you've not said anything about the power sector.
10:58We know India is very big on renewables, especially solar.
11:03So right now with the crisis, a little bit of crisis that we've faced in the power sector,
11:08is India bringing on board anything?
11:11Okay.
11:12So we can take these questions.
11:15Several questions, but I'm trying to summarize and condense a few of them.
11:29Let me take the first question on the trade and investments here.
11:32Now, it's very important item that was discussed in the delegation level talks today.
11:39Clearly, both the leaders have set a very ambitious target from three billion currently
11:48to about six billion dollars target in the next five years.
11:53As you know, the balance of trade is actually in favor of Ghana at this point of time
11:59because of large imports of gold into India.
12:02But we would like to diversify.
12:04The leaders are very clear that there is a need for diversification of the trade basket.
12:08So the target is set for six billion.
12:10Now, in the context of the Africa continent-wide free trade agreement,
12:14it provides a very interesting opportunity here
12:17because once you collapse your internal tariffs
12:20and bring uniform standards across the continent,
12:24then countries like Ghana could be extremely important
12:28and look like a gateway into the markets in subregion context.
12:33Let's say West Asian region, Ghana can be a potential gateway for us.
12:37We have to strategize how we can take advantage of this development.
12:42In terms of the investments, today India is one of the largest investor there.
12:48Two billion dollars of investments both by the private sector
12:51and India's own concession financing initiatives.
12:58So in the private sector, 900 Indian companies are operating.
13:03They are quite active, but their investments are modest.
13:06That comes around one billion dollar.
13:08India's lines of credit and grants put together comes about another one billion dollar.
13:13By that it is very modest.
13:15Now once your investment policy becomes attractive,
13:18and this depends a lot on your own domestic policy of investment policy becoming attractive for Indian companies,
13:26it will naturally happen.
13:28I think one of which is again creating these hubs, vaccine hubs, the manufacturing facilities,
13:33inviting companies, tax concessions that you might give.
13:36A lot will depend on that.
13:38But there is interest in Indian entrepreneurship to go and explore precisely the markets in Africa.
13:47And stable countries like Ghana is indeed one of the strongest attraction for us.
13:54Power sector, this item came up in the discussion for sure.
13:59And I think both leaders understand that power is very important for development and growth.
14:06India's had in the recent times in the renewable space had set a target of 500 gigawatts.
14:15And we are very much going towards the target with a lot of confidence.
14:21We have successfully introduced a gigawatt scale of solar parks in the country.
14:26I think there is a scope for replicating those models in this part of the world.
14:31But it is again the economics have to come into play.
14:35In the course of time we will have to see the industry interest,
14:40the off-take agreements that the governments will enter into,
14:43will provide that kind of lure and attraction for Indian companies.
14:50So we have to remain hopeful on that.
14:53Now setting up of plans and Prime Minister Mahama's twenty-four hour initiative here,
14:59again there was a discussion in the delegation level talks.
15:02But I think there was learning from each other,
15:06learning from the examples around the world.
15:08And India in some sense had introduced this in the educational field,
15:12that you try to have more shifts in skilling, in colleges,
15:19I think in the medical arena, you could have more shifts rather than just a day shift.
15:25So this was ideas exchanged between the two leaders,
15:29and President Mahama was very receptive to it,
15:32and he feels that Ghana can also position itself in those lines.
15:38Now timelines, we cannot set timelines for any of this,
15:42but I believe its market forces, the interests of the businesses will move
15:47and propel these kind of collaborations.
15:51BRICS, again you talked about Ghana wanting to be a BRICS member.
15:57I think already if you see from Africa you have already countries like Nigeria as a partner country,
16:08Uganda is joined as a partner country.
16:10I think the interest in BRICS is now growing.
16:15But again these decisions are not by one individual country.
16:18It's a consensus-based decision-making, so all the member countries would have to agree.
16:23But I think it's again how Ghana takes it up with other countries for its membership.
16:31And we would be happy to support Ghana's aspiration to be a BRICS member.
16:40The next wave of expansion when, as and when it happens,
16:45because today we went through two expansions.
16:47One was in 2009 when Africa, South Africa came in as a member,
16:51and now we have the second wave,
16:53which the large numbers have become full members and also permanent partner countries.
16:57The next wave we will have to see when that happens,
17:00but I think we will definitely keep that in mind given our strong relationship.
17:06West Africa is an opportunity.
17:08I think we have to understand again the West African geography and the natural resources that it possesses.
17:17I think in this belt you have extremely important rich mineral resources,
17:21including gas and oil, and some of which are not fully exploited because it's the same belt.
17:27And phosphate is another area, manganese is another area.
17:32So it's in the same zone that you are seeing opportunity here.
17:35I think Indian entrepreneurs are actively looking at it, seriously looking at it,
17:42and many of them are traveling to this part of the world and exploring opportunities.
17:47We will have to encourage greater commitment on their part and greater staying power in this region
17:56to be able to do enduring collaborations with countries like Ghana and others in West Africa.
18:03One last thing I would like to mention here is the Honorable Prime Minister Modi extended invitation to President Mahama to visit India at mutually convenient dates.
18:20We would be very delighted to have this exchange of visit happening at Sunna.
18:26I think in the days to come to diplomatic channels mutually convenient dates will be explored.
18:32I thank you very much for your patience.
18:36Thank you. With that we come to the end of this press briefing.
18:40Please do follow us on our social media handles for more updates on the programs tomorrow.
18:49Thank you very much.
18:57Thank you very much.
18:59Thank you very much.
