Samia commends India for advocating global reforms 

Dar es Salaam. President Samia Suluhu Hassan on Monday, October 9, 2023 commended India for advocating reforms in global bodies, including the United Nations Security Council and multilateral financial institutions during the recent G20 Summit.

The Head of State said the Asian country also advocated the World Trade Organisation (WTO) to align with the changing world dynamics, saying the change was essential for social and economic development.

President Hassan who is on a four-day state visit to India was speaking during a joint press conference with her Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

She commended India for successfully hosting the G20 Summit and Prime Minister Modi’s success in advocating the admission of Africa as the G20 full member.

“He (Prime Minister Modi) also advocated for debt relief initiatives to vulnerable nations and declared the urgency of mobilising finance for developing countries for clean energy technologies in order to attain net zero emissions by 2050,” said President Hassan, who also commended Mr Modi for his personal efforts of sending messages of unity and not polarisation.

Regarding trade and investment relations, President Hassan expressed her satisfaction with investments growth and increase in the number of Indian investors to Tanzania as well as the growing value of projects.

“On trade volumes, figures reached $3.1 billion as of 2022. This makes India the third largest Tanzania’s trading partner and the fifth largest investor in our country,” she said.

President Hassan added that the two countries have been cooperating in the supply of clean and safe water, defence and security as well as other issues of concern.

According to her, the decision by the Indian Institutes of Technology to establish the first ever overseas campus in Tanzania was an honour and privilege to the country.

“So, more are expected from this visit as we have managed to open different other avenues for social and economic cooperation as well as political development,” she said.

“Some of the areas have been mentioned and nicely articulated by the honourable Prime Minister [Modi]. I wouldn’t use much time on these areas, but we have agreed to open new areas of cooperation and scale up our cooperation to strategic partnerships frameworks,” she added.

Concluding her remarks, President Hassan reiterated Tanzania’s commitment to closely working with India in upgrading bilateral cooperation to strategic partnership that will advance the development agenda to greater heights.

Tanzania’s Foreign Affairs and East African Cooperation minister January Makamba was quoted by India’s Business Standard newspaper saying during the visit the two countries will sign 15 agreements covering different areas of cooperation.