NITI Aayog and BMZ sign SoI to promote cooperation between India and Germany

Under ambit of this SoI, NITI Aayog and BMZ would conduct joint research to assist in the development of approaches and formulation of policies to address multi-sectoral challenges.

To promote cooperation between India and Germany on various areas of mutual interest, NITI Aayog and Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation & Development (BMZ) signed Statement of Intent (SoI) on November 23, 2021. The Indian delegation was led by Dr Rajiv Kumar, Vice Chairperson, NITI Aayog, Government of India and the German delegation was led by Prof Dr Claudia Warning, Director General, BMZ, Government of Germany.

This SoI intends to establish an overarching mechanism as “NITI- BMZ Dialogue on Development Cooperation” to facilitate a common platform for periodic bilateral discussions, sharing of developmental policy experiences and means to have an overview of other ongoing bilateral programmes.

Under ambit of this SoI,  NITI Aayog and BMZ would conduct joint research to assist in the development of approaches and formulation of policies to address multi-sectoral challenges. Government agencies, leading think tanks, industry and academia would be involved from both the sides to analyse issues of relevance and to offer input to both sides fordeliberations.

NITI Aayog and BMZ realise importance of bilateral cooperation in fields of climate and Sustainable Development Goals, energy, emerging technologies, and agroecology. Lately, the two sides have been actively engaging for furthering the cooperation in these fields. Signing of the SoI by the two sides will strengthen the bilateral collaboration.

“NITI- BMZ Dialogue on Development Cooperation” would be a bi-annual Dialogue (once in two years) between the two sides to discuss and share insights on key issues being considered by NITI Aayog and BMZ. The Dialogue would be led by the Vice Chairman, NITI Aayog and the Director General responsible for South Asia cooperation, BMZ. The first Dialogue is expected to be held in the month of February of 2022.

On this occasion, Dr Kumar and Prof Dr Warning also launched the inaugural SDG Urban Index & Dashboard (2021-22). The SDG Urban Index and Dashboard ranks 56 urban areas on 77 SDG indicators. The data on these indicators have been sourced from official data sources such as NFHS, NCRB, U-DISE, data portals of various ministries, and other government data sources. The index and dashboard will further strengthen SDG localization and institute robust SDG monitoring at the city level. It highlights the strengths and gaps of ULB-level data, monitoring, and reporting systems. Tools such as this index and dashboard will contribute to the creation of an ecosystem in which all stakeholders will be equipped to adopt and implement data-driven decision making. This transformative change is quite essential, given the increasing prominence of our cities and urban areas in charting the future of development in India.

On the topic of collaboration in fields of frontier technology, Dr Kumar informed that NITI Aayog would explore the possibility to work with the German side for developing Artificial Intelligence based solutions to solve the challenges associated with climate change. NITI Aayog wishes to engage with German side to address the issues of transparency, bias, fairness, accountability and privacy with regards to Artificial Intelligence.

(With Inputs from PIB)