The EU and India have strengthened their relationship as strategic partners by setting up a new Trade and Technology Council (TTC). The new TTC will deepen strategic engagement on trade and technology between both partners. This follows the announcement by President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen and Prime Minister of India, Narendra Modi, on 25 April 2022 in New Delhi. It will be co-chaired on the EU side by Executive Vice-Presidents Margrethe Vestager and Valdis Dombrovskis, and on the Indian side by Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, Minister of External Affairs, Piyush Goyal, Minister of Commerce and Industry, and Ashwini Vaishnaw, Minister of Electronics and Information Technology.
In a rapidly changing geopolitical environment, the EU and India have a common interest in ensuring security, prosperity and sustainable development based on shared values. The TTC will provide the political steer and the necessary structure to coordinate approaches and advance technical work. To lay the groundwork, both sides have agreed to work on critical areas such as connectivity, green technologies and resilient supply chains.
Ministerial meetings of the TTC will rely on the preparatory work of three working groups, which will meet within two weeks to organise their work:
- Strategic technologies, digital governance and digital connectivity
- Green & clean energy technologies
- Trade, investment and resilient value chains
The Boston Global Forum (BGF), in collaboration with the United Nations Centennial Initiative, released a major work entitled Remaking the World – Toward an Age of Global Enlightenment. More than twenty distinguished leaders, scholars, analysts, and thinkers put forth unprecedented approaches to the challenges before us. These include President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen, Governor Michael Dukakis, Father of Internet Vint Cerf, Former Secretary of Defense Ash Carter, Harvard University Professors Joseph Nye and Thomas Patterson, MIT Professors Nazli Choucri and Alex ‘Sandy’ Pentland. The BGF introduced core concepts shaping pathbreaking international initiatives, notably, the Social Contract for the AI Age, an AI International Accord, the Global Alliance for Digital Governance, the AI World Society (AIWS) Ecosystem, and AIWS City.
