Australia embarks on India fence-mending mission
Updated
Three Australian government ministers are heading to India, as Canberra steps up efforts to bolster the bi-lateral relationship.
Australia will be seeking new trade opportunities and will be reassuring Indians officials that Australia is a safe place to send their students. The other big issue will be a trade ministers meeting involving the US and Indian representatives who couldn't agree on WTO negotiations during last year's Doha Round talks.
Presenter: Liam Cochrane
Speakers: Simon Crean, Australia's Trade Minister
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CREAN: I don't think the election itself is the setback. As you know, we have had difficulty progressing the free trade agreement with Japan essentially because of agriculture. In part, that can be resolved if we can conclude the Doha round and that's another important aspect of the visit to India this week, to try and get momentum into that. But I think that we need to understand the broader relationship with Japan, indeed as we do with India, and we will come to that in a minute. But Japan has been consistently our largest trading partner now for decades. The importance of the two economies to each other is unquestioned. Apart from a very close associations, governments of all persuasions have had with the LDP, we have also in the past 18 months on all of our visits to Japan made important contact with the new government.
COCHRANE: Could there be perhaps new opportunities for Australia in Japan, given that the amount of government debt means the country will probably be seeking private funding for infrastructure projects?
CREAN: Look, I think that there is always huge opportunity in a relationship that is already well established. What we have got to do is to get in as quickly as we can with the new government to talk about the opportunities, like you've just mentioned, infrastructure, I think is one, but the whole question of energy security, food security, which is the flip side of their support for agriculture. I think that we can find important complementarities in food processing, as well as energy security, as well as infrastructure and logistics. In part the difficulty with the Japanese economy is the way in which it has not embraced as much as people said it should, outside of Japan of course, structural reform, internal adjustments and I think it is going to be an interesting question as to how quickly the new government or how well the new government raises to that challenge.
COCHRANE: Well, let's move to your impending trip to India. The trade ministers meeting in Delhi that you will be attending, obviously very important. You are a Doha optimist, but there are still those who say that the trade talks are doomed. What specifically needs to come out of this meeting in your view?
CREAN: Well, not just optimism, but concrete advance going forward and indeed we have had that concrete advance ever since the middle of the year, since the Indian elections, which saw an important new mandate for Prime Minister Singh's government and he is an economic reformer, ever since the G20 leaders have called for the conclusion of the Doha round, we have sought the opportunity to open the window again. We did that with the Cairns group meeting in Bali in June, followed up by an OECD meeting and an APEC meeting. All three of those meetings have given vital political impetus to concluding the round. Interestingly, India turned up at the Bali meeting, their new commerce minister within ten days of being sworn in, and India and the United States have both signalled they want to play a constructive role in concluding it. That is an ingredient we did not have last July. Interestingly, India offered to host this mini-ministerial which is taking place in Delhi this week, that is another positive sign. So look, all the signs are there, Liam. The question is can we ensure that the political will keeps driving forward, that has got to be our objective and if we can get that right, I think we can report significant progress to the Pittsburg meeting of the G20 in September.
COCHRANE: Simon Crean, just finally in the 30 seconds or so we've got remaining. I want to come to the issue of the international education reputation of Australia, especially in India. Obviously the problems have been widely reported on this station and on other media in Australia and India. What message are you taking to India about Australia's brand as a destination for international students?
CREAN: That we want to protect it, we want to secure it and we want to ensure the continued safety of Indian students when they come down here. We do acknowledge that there has been a big problem with this. It has drawn huge attention, in India itself. It's one of the reasons the deputy PM is up there. But it is not just the issue of the safety, Liam, as important as that is. It is about protecting our brand, because our brand is quality education. We can't afford to let that be debased and I am working very closely with Julia to ensure that both the safety and the brand are protected and we convey it in the strongest possible terms, that message to our Indian counterpart.
