India launches five global initiatives for developing countries as G20 President

NEW DELHI, 18th January, 2023 (WAM) -- India will establish a "Global-South Centre of Excellence" to find solutions for development problems in less industrialised and middle-income countries.

The new institution will undertake research on best practices of many nations, which can then be scaled and implemented in others.

The proposal is among the summary of deliberations at the Voice of Global South Summit 2023, hosted by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi last week and released by the Ministry of External Affairs. "Global South" is a term used in geo-economics to refer to regions outside the developed nations in Europe and North America.

Leaders and ministers from 125 countries, including 14 Arab countries – among them three GCC states – took part in the two-day virtual Summit, which was part of India's ongoing Presidency of the Group of Twenty (G20).

The UAE is a regular invitee to G20 summits. The UAE took part in the Voice of Global South deliberations. The other two attendees from the GCC were Bahrain and Oman.

Modi told leaders who attended the Summit that "the digital public services developed by India in fields like electronic payments, health, education or e-governance can be useful for many other developing countries" via the new Centre.

The official summary of the Summit proceedings said India will launch a "Global-South Science and Technology Initiative" to share expertise in areas like space technology and nuclear energy.

India's "vaccine maitri" initiative during the COVID-19 pandemic – when Indian-made vaccines were supplied to more than 100 nations – is to be converted to a new "aarogya maitri" project. Maitri and aarogya are Hindi words which mean friendship and health, respectively.

The other initiatives from the Summit are a "Global-South Young Diplomats Forum" and "Global-South Scholarships." Modi said, "India will institute Global-South Scholarships for students from developing countries to pursue higher education in India."

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