India, Japan and Australia is to execute “Supply Chain Resilience Initiative” to counter China

The initiative aims to reduce the dependency in China

• India, Australia, and Japan have started the discussions for the launch of a trilateral Supply Chain Resilience Initiative (SCRI)
• It is for in order to reduce the dependency on China. The initiative which was first proposed by Japan might be executed
• The officials have been working on the dates to hold the first meeting of the commerce and trade ministers of the three countries

Initiative from Japan

• Earlier, Japan through its Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry had approached India and had pressed on the urgency of taking the initiative forward
• In the light of China’s aggressive moves in the Line of Actual Control in Ladakh, the Indian government has decided to consider the proposal quite seriously
• As per the sources, Tokyo was in favour of launching SCRI by November 2020

Objectives of trilateral Supply Chain Resilience Initiative (SCRI)

• It can be assumed that the objective of the Japanese proposal is two-fold
• One is to attract foreign direct investment to turn the Indo-Pacific into an ‘economic powerhouse’ Second to build a mutually complementary relationship between the partner countries
• The idea has also been to throw open the initiative to the ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations) after India-Japan-Australia builds an understanding of the matter.
• The objective of the countries will be to work out a plan to build on the existential supply chain network
• Japan and India, for example, have an India-Japan competitiveness partnership dealing with locating the Japanese companies in India

Highlights of Supply Chain Resilience Initiative (SCRI)

• Supply Chain Resilience Initiative (SCRI) is a direct response to the individual economies and companies who are concerned about the Chinese political behavior and the disruption which may lead to supply chains
• The purpose of creating the supply chain will be to improve its resilience across the Indo-Pacific, which through such an effort will be able to develop a sound economic profile to its security logic
• The businesses now have started seeing India as a “hub for supply chains”. Hence, Indian Government appears to have taken the call to become the part of global supply chain and emerge as an alternative to China
• It is to be noted that PM Modi mentioned that the businesses are now seeing India as a hub for Supply chains during his speech at the I-Day celebrations, 2020

Triangular approach to Indo-Pacific Diplomacy

• Their geographic locations value the triangular approach to Indo-Pacific Diplomacy. The following are the key highlights of the trio’s steps in the Indo-Pacific countering China’s actions
• India and Japan are building their new partnerships in the areas of security, political and economic cooperation.
• There is convergence between Japan’s Free and Open Indo-Pacific Strategy and India’s Act East Policy
• India and Australia conduct anti-submarine warfare exercises. They have also established strong people-to-people links
• Australia and Japan have joint ventures that identify India as key third partner, especially those related to Indo-Pacific Region

Pic courtesy : unews.in