Assam chief minister Sarbananda Sonowal on Tuesday interacted with the delegates of Sampark Yatra – a delegation comprising MLAs and senior officials of Assam Government which will visit Bangladesh and Myanmar from Wednesday to July 4 next.
The programme was held the conference hall of chief minister’s office at Janata Bhawan.
Notably the 30-member team, which consist 14 MLAs and other senior IAS and ACS officers, would be led by industry and commerce minister Chandra Mohan Patowary.
The tour is undertaken to sensitize the decision makers of the location advantage of these countries to Assam and the potential economic growth of the region by partnering them.
The delegation would hold meetings with relevant stakeholders such as transporters, exporters, chambers of commerce, senior government officials in those countries and try to explore opportunities for furthering business activities.
Urging the delegates to present the strength of Assam due to its geographical position at the centre of ASEAN and South East Asia, chief minister Sonowal reiterated the state government’s initiatives to catapult Guawahati as a gateway to South East Asia taking advantage of the Prime Minister Narendra Modi led central government’s Act East Policy.
He also referred to successful organization of ‘Advantage Assam: Global Investment Summit’ in 2018 which paved the way for attracting big ticket investments to the State and setting up of two consulate offices of Bhutan and Bangladesh in Guwahati.
Calling for more measures to increase people to people contact and cultural exchange with the neighbouring countries, the chief minister highlighted Assam Government’s initiatives to seize the momentum by building on the success of Advantage Assam which opened the way for starting direct flights to many international destinations from Guwahati.
In the days to come, more and more business and trade activities would be started with the southeast Asian countries while delegations of the State Government would also visit other countries of the region in near future to speed up economic activities, he informed.
Minister for Commerce and Industry, Act East Policy Affairs Department etc Chandra Mohan Patowary and additional chief secretary of Act East Policy Affairs Department also spoke in the programme.