Three University of Fiji academics from the School of Business and Economics who were engaged as Think Tanks by the Embassy of the Republic of Indonesia in Fiji believe the economic cooperation between Fiji and Indonesia has potential for growth.
The University of Fiji says a preliminary market and trade analysis report that serves as a leading document for further in-depth analysis of collaboration between Fiji and Indonesia was compiled by Amit Prakash, Dr Murage Ranasinghe and Priteshni Chand.
They say the research findings were initially disseminated to the Think Tank Division of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Indonesia at the University of Fiji’s Samabula campus and the delegation was led by the Director General for Foreign Policy Strategy Agency.
Amit Prakash says the Republic of Indonesia proposes to grant a non-reciprocal bilateral trade preference to the Republic of Fiji Islands to strengthen trade relationships.
Prakash says Indonesia will act as a development partner via the Generalized System of Preference with the aim of strengthening trade relationships and ensuring a more balanced two-way trade flow.
He says collaboration between Fiji and Indonesia as development partners can potentially influence trading activities amongst the Melanesian Spearhead Group economies and could result in a more unified trade and economic growth within the Melanesian region.
He adds overall, the government of Indonesia has recently rolled out various initiatives to strengthen the socio-economic relationship with Fiji.
Prakash further says Indonesia possesses development and industrialization experiences as well as innovation and technological capabilities that can be shared with Fiji, thus benefiting Fiji’s industrialization effort and adding value to local Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) processing activities.
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