ITEC) Programme 1

CENTRE FOR POLICY RESEARCH Premier think tank shaping policy debates since 1973

50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation

Indian Development Cooperation Research Report

January 2015

The project on Indian Development Cooperation at the Centre for Policy Research is supported by the Asia Foundation. The views expressed by the author(s) do not necessarily reflect those of the Foundation or the Funder. 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation A Report

January 2015 CONTENTS

Preface i

Introduction

The History and Evolution of the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) Programme 1

Country Profiles

Afghanistan 10

Bhutan 13

Chile 14

Ethiopia 16

Myanmar 17

Namibia 19

Papua New Guinea 21

Vietnam 23

Institute Profiles

The Barefoot College 25

Central Institute of Tool Design 28

Entrepreneurship Development Institute 30

The Indian Institute of Management (Ahmedabad) 31

Key Recommendations 33

About IDCR 34

IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation i PREFACE In 2014, the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) programme celebrated its 50th anniversary, marking five decades of tremendous growth. In its inaugural year, 1964–65, ITEC offered technical and economic training in India to 80 government officials from other developing countries. By 2014-15, ITEC was offering training to more than 10,000 candidates from 161 countries, bringing the total number of people trained under ITEC since its inception to more than 50,000. The Indian ITEC programme has addressed the needs of generations of civil servants and policy makers from countries across South Asia, Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia, drawing on various aspects of India’s own socio-economic development. Yet many of its successes remain little known both within and outside of India. To address this critical gap in understanding India’s growing development assistance, the Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) initiative at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, undertook a detailed study of the ITEC programme, with grant support from The Asia Foundation. The study was conducted between May and December 2014. IDCR’s analysis of countries, institutes, and individuals—including former and current students and foreign service officers—provides a nuanced understanding of ITEC and makes important recommendations to ensure the programme is robust and contributes meaningfully to India’s current regional goals. Instituted through a cabinet note on September 15, 1964, ITEC had relatively modest beginnings, but has grown in size and diversity of offerings, particularly over the past decade. Although India has long had development knowledge to share with other countries, it was unable to finance large-scale development projects abroad until the early part of this century. The cost-effective ITEC programme thus emerged as the main delivery mechanism of Indian aid in the 1960s. When India’s economy liberalized during the 1990s and 2000s, India’s development assistance budget began to grow and ITEC was joined by a range of assistance programmes. With more resources available, India increased its efforts to build development partnerships by extending lines of credit, project assistance, and more budgetary loans for road and rail infrastructure projects, housing development projects, information technology-related projects and hydropower plants, among others. By 2014-15, the Government of India’s allocations to technical and economic cooperation amounted to less than three percent of India’s overall development assistance budget. Yet despite representing a smaller share of India’s overall development partnerships, the ITEC programme continues to remain a significant part of India’s overall development partnership abroad. This is in large part due to ITEC’s continued emphasis on a demand-driven approach, which allows ITEC partner countries to leverage the programme to address self-identified lacunae in their socio-economic development plans. Further, the generations of civil servants and policy makers trained through ITEC have helped spread positive perceptions of India, translating into broader mutual political, economic and geo-strategic benefits for India and ITEC partner countries. The countries analysed in this report are not necessarily those that receive the most ITEC slots. Similarly, the institutes the report has focused on are not necessarily those that train the most participants. Public data on the ITEC programme was sparse and efforts to obtain information through official channels did not always prove successful. Data constraints have largely determined the choices of the countries and institutes analysed. Building on synthesised data and interactions with a wide range of stakeholders in the ITEC programme, this report provides an unprecedented understanding of India’s technical and economic cooperation at a time when the scope of training offered and number of countries and participants in the ITEC programme continue to grow. We hope that this report will contribute towards better understanding of a programme that has done much to share India’s development experiences with other countries, has engendered goodwill abroad, and has helped further India’s political and economic diplomacy. Rani D. Mullen Director, Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) Initiative Centre for Policy Research New Delhi January 2015 Please note that the findings of this report, including its recommendations, do not necessarily reflect the views of the Centre for Policy Research or The Asia Foundation. 1 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation The History and Evolution of the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) Programme

Shortly after gaining independence on August 15, 1947, India began engaging with other countries through development partnerships. Social and economic advancement was seen in India and other countries emerging from the yoke of colonialism as the key to modernization and development. In addition to financial resources, developing countries needed access to technology and technological expertise in order to foster socio-economic development. Given independent India’s own economic constraints as a developing country and New Delhi’s consequent inability to fund large-scale development projects abroad, India largely focused on building development partnerships by sharing technical and industrial expertise gained and lessons learned. During the 1950s India’s cooperative efforts at sharing their expertise with other countries in Asia, Africa and even Latin America took the form of cost-effective measures like providing training, deputing experts, and undertaking small scale development projects. For example, India provided training to Bhutanese nationals in river gauge and rain gauge observations in 1956 and training scholarships to Afghan musicians in 1958. India’s focus on building capacity in Asia and Africa stemmed from an understanding that countries of the Global South had a responsibility towards each other to foster development.1 This shared sense of responsibility among countries of the Global South to share development experiences and learn from each other also informed India’s decision to engage in cooperation through multilateral initiatives like the Colombo Plan of 1950. India started providing development cooperation and technical and economic training shortly after attaining independence. By the early 1960s the multiplicity of development assistance programmes led the Indian government to institutionalize its development cooperation. On September 15, 1964 the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) program was founded by the Indian Cabinet as the main development assistance program of the Government of India. Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, who also held the portfolio of the External Affairs Minister, was the chief visionary behind the new ITEC program, though the program was launched after the demise of Nehru by Prime Minister Lal Bahadur Shastri. The ITEC programme was initially intended as India’s main vehicle for sharing its lessons on development with other developing countries and was essentially India’s bilateral assistance programme through the end of the 20th century. For example, India’s lessons from its Green Revolution of the 1960s and the White (dairy) Revolution of the 1980s led to an increase in demand from other developing countries for agricultural training in India.

ITEC resources were also used, as early as the 1960s, to fund regional and inter-regional technical and economic assistance programmes such as the Economic Commission for Africa. By the 21st century ITEC resources were contributing to the growing numbers of regional and multilateral organizations such as the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC), the Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA), and the African Union (AU). Not only has the ITEC programme evolved from a largely bilateral assistance programme to include funding for regional and multilateral organization, the breadth of Indian development cooperation has also evolved substantially. From its inception in the 1960s when ITEC was largely focused on sharing technical and economic expertise, Indian development assistance under ITEC also included small numbers and amounts of grants and loans for development assistance in the areas of disaster relief, as well as agricultural and industrial development. However, grants and loans to other countries was only a small percentage of Indian development cooperation in the 1960s. By the turn of the century, Indian grants, loans and advances to other countries overtook technical and economic expertise provided in terms of the amount of resources allocated to these different mechanisms of development assistance. In 2013/14 the amount of funds allocated by the Government of India towards technical and economic training comprised only two percent of India’s overall development assistance budget, when a couple of decades earlier it had comprised the majority of Indian development assistance.

1 See for example ‘Selected Works of Jawaharlal Nehru,’ Vol. 28, p. full text of Nehru’s speech at Bandung, available athttp://www.claudearpi.net/maintenance/uploaded_pics/SW28.pdf (accessed 30th October 2014). The History and Evolution of the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) program 2

ITEC therefore was the main delivery mechanism of Indian development assistance until the 1990s. However, as India’s economy liberalised during the 1990s, India increased its efforts to strengthen development partnerships by extending Lines of Credit and a greater volume of grants and budgetary loans. With the onset of the 21st century, as India’s development assistance efforts diversified, the ITEC programme evolved from being the main delivery mechanism of Indian aid in the 1960s, to one of several ways through which India delivers development assistance today. This change in what constitutes Indian development cooperation in the 21st century is reflected in the administration of India’s development partnerships by the Ministry of External Affairs, though not in the language used by in the Indian budget, leading to some confusion. The Ministry of External Affairs in 2012 formed a new structure within the ministry, the Development Partnership Administration (DPA), to admin- ister Indian development assistance. Within DPA, DPA-I administers project appraisals and Lines of Credit, DPA-II administers disaster relief, capacity building schemes and ITEC, and DPA-III administers project implementation. However, the Government of India’s budget as of 2014-15 continues to report all development cooperation under a heading titled “Technical & Economic Cooperation with Other Countries and Advances to Foreign Governments,” within which ITEC is listed as a separate category. This official use of ITEC to at times represent only technical and economic training, while at other times it is used synony- mously with Indian development cooperation reflects the ongoing evolution of India’s ITEC programme from a small programme focused on training to an increasingly significant development cooperation programme. Technical training through ITEC: 1964-1999 Though the training India offered through the ITEC programme was initially small, the programme grew quickly. During its first year of operation in 1964-65, ITEC offered 80 training slots. Two years later, in 1966-67, it was already offering 150 slots to 9 countries. The programme grew steadily to offer 280 candidates from 45 countries an opportunity to train in India by 1974, 1,967 candidates from 145 countries by 1999, and 10,000 candidates from 161 countries in 2014-15. In addition to training students in India, the ITEC programme continued to focus on building capacity by deputing experts, sending over 1,000 experts to over 30 countries between 1970 and 1977. Despite India’s inability to match the volume of grants extended by developed nations, through the ITEC programme India has been able to effectively share the skills in human resource development it possesses, which are often “more appropriate to the geographical and ecological conditions and the stage of technological development of several developing countries.”2 For example, India’s own experiences in boosting rice production during the Green Revolution in the 1960s positioned India to better understand the needs of other developing countries that were eager to boost their agricultural production. Building on this experience, India began extending support to the Vietnamese agricultural sector in 1976-77, offering ITEC scholarships in agricultural research and development. At the same time, India also used ITEC funding to set up the Cuu Long Rice Research Institute (CLRRI) in Vietnam – a research institute that now produces rice which competes with Indian rice on international markets. India’s ITEC scholarships and the work carried out by the CLRRI helped Vietnam to transform its agricultural sector and emerge as one of the largest global exporters of rice. When requested by a country, India also deputes experts to the country. This form of ITEC assistance proved to be another means for India to build capacity and strengthen bilateral ties with many ITEC partner countries throughout the 1970s and the 1980s. A noteworthy example was Afghanistan. India’s capacity building efforts in Afghanistan during the 1970s saw an exceptionally strong focus on deputing experts under ITEC. Between 1970 and 1977, nearly 30 percent of the experts India deputed under ITEC were deputed to Afghanistan to build capacity in sectors such as aviation, mining, agriculture and health.3

2 See website of the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) program available at www.itec.nic.in. (accessed 16th December, 2014).

3 See Annual Reports of the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India from 1969/70 to 1977/78 available at http://mealib.nic.in/?2386?000 (accessed 30th October, 2014). 3 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation

Geo-political circumstances in subsequent decades would test India’s bilateral relationship with Afghanistan.4 However, with the ouster of the Taliban government from Afghanistan in the post September- 2001 period, India and Afghanistan could build on the strong ties fostered through India’s development cooperation efforts of the 1970s and the 1980s to more effectively work together towards realising shared geo-strategic and economic goals. By 2015, annual ITEC allocations to Afghanistan reached 675 regular ITEC training slots, plus an additional 258 discretionary slots - the largest number offered to any country. As budget allocations for ITEC grew steadily during the 1980s, India broadened the programme’s focus to include more countries in Africa and the Middle East, building closer ties with Mauritius, Zambia, and People's Democratic Republic of Yemen.5 India helped Mauritius make its sugar industry more efficient, built vocational training centres in Zambia, and conducted feasibility studies for building industrial estates in Yemen. A growing ITEC budget during this decade also allowed India to build deeper development partnerships with countries as distant as Cuba, where India conducted a feasibility study for a railway project in 1984-85 and Mongolia, where India provided assistance to produce a documentary film in 1986- 87. During the early 1990s India experienced a balance of payment crisis. This crisis led Indian politics to be largely focused on dealing with the internal economic crisis. However, India’s capacity building efforts through ITEC continued throughout the economic crisis. India’s eagerness to strengthen ties with nations that were emerging at the end of the Cold War translated into ITEC actually growing to include newly independent countries like Armenia, Georgia, and Uzbekistan.6 During the 1990s, the ITEC budget also grew from INR 130 million in 1991-92 to INR 340 million in 1998-99. Figure 1: India's total development assistance (grants, loans, LOCs and ITEC), 2000-01 to 2013-14 India’s Growing Development Assistance programme Although the volume of India’s development assistance has historically been significantly smaller than the foreign aid budgets of OECD-DAC (the Development Assistance Committee of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) donor countries, India’s development assistance programme has grown remarkably since the turn of the 21st century, increasing more than twelve- fold between 2001 and 2014 (from INR 11.86 billion to INR 147.59 billion). As of 2014-15, Indian assistance through grants and loans alone total INR 80 billion (US$ 1.4 billion). If one adds the Lines of Credit, India’s total development assistance budget is comparable to the foreign assistance programmes of smaller developed countries such as Austria.7

4The India Afghanistan relationship “deteriorated when India was one of the first and few countries to recognize the Soviet-installed government in Kabul in the early 1980s. Even so, India remained engaged with Afghanistan during the civil war that followed Soviet withdrawal in 1989, providing Afghanistan with several million U.S. dollars in grants and humanitarian assistance through the United Nations during the 1990s. It was only with the rise of the Taliban in 1993 did India totally sever official relations with Afghanistan. Instead, from the 1990s up until 2001 India provided development assistance to Afghanistan through funding for United Nations (UN) agencies providing humanitarian assistance in the country. During this period, India also provided intelligence and military support to the Northern Alliance, the main anti-Taliban force.” See Rani D. Mullen, ‘The India-Afghanistan Partnership’ India Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) Project, Bilateral Brief no. 2, 16th May 2013 (last updated 16th May, 2013). Available at http://idcr.cprindia.org/blog/india-afghanistan-partnership (accessed 30th October, 2014).

5See Annual Reports of the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India from 1979/80 to 1989/90, available at http://mealib.nic.in/?2386?000 (accessed 16th December, 2014).

6See Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India ‘Annual Report, 1992-93,’ available at http://mealib.nic.in/?2521?000 (accessed 30th October, 2014). Also see Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, ‘India – Uzbekistan Relations,’ available at http://meaindia.nic.in/meaxpsite/foreignrelation/uzbekistan.pdf (accessed 30th October, 2014).

7Considering that like most DAC donors, much of Indian aid is de facto tied to sourcing goods and services from India, accounting for the greater purchasing power of a US dollar spent in India, India’s development assistance budget becomes several times higher than its value in dollar terms at current prices. IDCR’s calculations indicate that in terms of Purchasing Power Parity, India’s 2014-15 development assistance budget is closer to US$ 5.3 billion, making it larger than Norway’s aid budget and comparable to that of Australia in 2014. The History and Evolution of the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) program 4

Figure 2: Budget Commitments for training through the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) program, 2008-09 to 2014-15 Developing Human Resources through ITEC 2500

2000 2000 As India’s development assistance programme grows in volume and

n 1500 1410.8 o 1500 diversity, a quickly expanding budget i l

l 1158.6

i for technical and economic training 1037.7

m 946.61 1000 indicates that Indian development R 650 N assistance retains a strong focus on I 500 building human resources. INR 2 billion (approximately US$ 32 million) 0 was allocated towards ITEC alone 2008-09 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14 2014-15 during 2014-15. This meant that in Commitments to ITEC (INR million) 2014-15, over 10,000 candidates from Source: Data collated by the Indian Development Cooperation Research initiative, at the Centre for 161 ITEC partner countries had an Policy Research, New Delhi from publically available sources. opportunity to enrol in 283 short-term training courses at 48 institutes across India.8 The wide range of courses offered, combined with ITEC’s demand-driven approach, allows partner countries to leverage the ITEC programme to strengthen capacity in areas they identify as priorities for their socio-economic development.

As of 2014-15, ITEC offers training to over 8,500 civilian and 1,500 defense personnel. Prestigious institutions such as the Indian Institutes of Management,9 the Indian Institutes of Technology,10 the National Defence College, and the Central Institute of Tool Design currently conduct ITEC courses. By offering ITEC students the opportunity to train at the country’s premier educational institutes, India seeks to impart high quality training through ITEC.

The ITEC programme has largely focused on training government officials. With over 50,000 civil servants and policy makers from 161 countries being trained under ITEC since its inception in 1964, the programme has been instrumental in India’s efforts to strengthen ties with countries around the world. The increased understanding of India that ITEC often fosters among trainees has also resulted in new opportunities for Indian trade and business, as well as intellectual exchanges, further strengthening economic and geo- strategic linkages between India and ITEC partner countries.

ITEC courses are grouped into the following categories:

1. Accounts, Audit, Banking and Finance

These include courses on public expenditure management, government accounts, auditing of public sector enterprises and banking courses. Some institutes offering these courses include Institute of Government and Finance in New Delhi and the National Institute of Bank Management in Pune.

2. Information Technology, Telecommunications, and English

These include courses on multimedia and web designing, English language, telemedicine, database management, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), and programming languages. National institutes such as the Center for Development of Advanced Computing in Pune and Mohali, the University of English and Foreign Languages in Hyderabad, and private institutes such as NIIT and Aptech conduct these courses.

8The ITEC program has several other components such as coordinating aid for disaster relief and conducting feasibility studies. However, the focus of IDCR’s study is ITEC’s technical training component.

9Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad (Gujarat).

10Indian Institute of Technology, Rourkee (Uttarakhand). 5 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation

3. Management courses These include courses on leadership training, human resource management and corporate governance at institutes such as the Administrative Staff College in Hyderabad and the Institute of Applied Manpower and Research in New Delhi. Under ‘management courses’ ITEC slots for a one year Executive management course at the Indian Institute of Management at Ahmedabad are also offered. 4. Small and Medium Enterprises/Rural Development This category has a diverse offering of courses that range from entrepreneurship development, small business planning, women’s empowerment, tourism and hospitality and agri-business among others. The National Institute of Rural Development, the National Institute for Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises and the Entrepreneurship Development Institute at Ahmedabad are some institutes that offer training in these courses. 5. Specialized courses This category includes courses that require the candidate to have prior experience in the field they wish to study. For example, courses are offered to parliamentary officials on legislative drafting, to engineers and urban planners on urban service planning. Courses on development journalism are offered to candidates from developing countries. Other courses include forensics, statistics and programmes on dispute settle- ment offered at institutes such as the National Crimes Record Bureau, the Indian Institute of Foreign Trade and the Bureau of Parliamentary Studies and Training. 6. Technical courses These courses include training on fertilizer quality control, solar power generation, remote sensing, textile management and tool design at institutes such as the Central Institute of Tool Design in Hyderabad, the South India Textile Research Association in Coimbatore and the Indian Institute of Remote Sensing among others. In addition, one year diplomas and two year Masters of Technology programme on hydrology and water resource management are offered by the Indian Institute of Technology in Roorkee. 7. Environment and Renewable Energy Courses offered under this category include developing renewable technologies for more efficiently harnessing wind, hydro and solar power. These courses are offered at institutes such as the Tata Energy Resources Institute, the Centre for Wind Energy Technology and the Alternate Hydro Energy Centre. 8. Defence training India also offers defence training through ITEC. Defence personnel from other countries undertake training programmes at Indian defence institutions such as the National Defence Academy in Pune, the Defence Services and Staff College in Ooty, the Indian Military Academy in Dehradun and the National Defence College in New Delhi. In addition to short-term training courses, under the ITEC programme, the following activities are undertaken: Deputation of Experts The ITEC programme has deputed experts when requested by the ITEC recipient country. Since the programme’s inception in 1964, over 2,000 Indian experts have been sent abroad to help other developing countries build capacity in information technology, agriculture and English language training among many other sectors. The experts deputed under ITEC were initially chosen by a selection committee that was setup by the MEA in 1965. During the 1960s, India deputed experts to assist with the rehabilitation of Zambian nationals returning from Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe). Other experts helped countries like Malaysia set up medical centres, and prepare plans for health and education related projects in Afghanistan. Though deputing experts has a few drawbacks—for example, those receiving training do not get the opportunity to see India first hand—it does have the significant advantage of cost-effectiveness, since deputing a few Indian experts abroad to potentially train many in the recipient countries costs less than training dozens of foreign government officials in India. The History and Evolution of the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) program 6

In recent years, under ITEC, Indian experts have been deputed to assist partner countries in fields such as pest management, military training, auditing, medicine and irrigation. In 2013-14, India deputed around 34 civilian and defence experts to various countries. Study Tours of India At the request of ITEC partner countries, India organizes short study tours during which delegates from ITEC partner countries visit training institutes across India. Through these visits, ITEC partner countries are given an opportunity to more closely observe management and administration practices at Indian institutes, making it easier for them to adopt these among similar institutes in their own countries as well as in their own management practices. Project Related Activities Though the ITEC programme’s primary focus is on providing short-term educational programmes, India also engages in a few ‘project related activities’ that do not specifically focus on technical training. Examples of such ITEC activities include the conservation of the Ta Phrom temple complex at Angkor Wat in Cambodia between 2004 and 2013, the conservation and restoration of the UNESCO World Heritage site WatPhu in Laos between 2006 and 2013, and the India-Bangladesh border fencing project between 2006 and 2009. Other projects include conducting feasibility studies for the development of the small and medium enterprise sector in Zimbabwe in 2004 and undertaking civil construction work for the India- Maldives Friendship Faculty of Hospitality and Tourism Studies in 2007. However, since 2007-08, most ‘project related activities’ have been moved out of ITEC and are now being financed by grant-based assistance. Disaster Relief As part of its development assistance programme, India also provides assistance for disaster relief through ITEC. For example, in 2004, using ITEC resources, India donated 1,000 tons of wheat (worth INR 16.7 million) to North Korea and supplied medicines (worth INR 2 million) to the Dominican Republic. However, since 2008-09, a separate budget head titled ‘Aid for Disaster Relief’ was added to route most disaster relief. With this establishing of a separate international disaster assistance budget category in 2008-09, it appears that no ITEC training funds have since been used for disaster relief provision. Gifts and Donations of Equipment Under ITEC, the Government of India also provides gifts and donates equipment to ITEC partner countries. Recent examples include a gift of computers (worth INR 1 million) made to the Vietnam Navy in 2009 and a gift of medical store equipment (worth INR 0.5 million) made to Cambodia in 2008. Special Commonwealth Africa Assistance programme (SCAAP) In 1960, the Special Commonwealth Africa Assistance programme (SCAAP) was established by the Prime Ministers of the Commonwealth nations of Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand to provide aid to the newly independent Commonwealth countries in Africa.11 Although India was not a founding member of SCAAP,12 it recognised the advantages that such a multilateral platform for development cooperation would provide India as it sought to increase its engagement in Africa. In 1964, when India established the ITEC programme, it also began providing training to African countries through SCAAP. Like the training activities undertaken through ITEC, India technical assistance through SCAAP continues to provide African countries opportunities to develop skills in information technology, rural development and health among other sectors. Given the similar nature of activities undertaken through SCAAP and ITEC, SCAAP has been functioning as a corollary to the ITEC programme and was usually reported as part of ITEC in the Indian budgets. However, since 2009-10, SCAAP has been listed in the Ministry of External Affairs’ budget under a separate budget heading, ‘SCAAP’. Like the ITEC programme, Indian technical assistance through SCAAP has grown from 19 African countries that India engaged with in 1964,13 to include over 30 African countries as of 2014-15.

11See Onwumere “Canada’s Relations with Commonwealth West Africa”, Mcmaster University, 1978, p. 104, available at https://macsphere.mcmaster.ca/bitstream/11375/9609/1/fulltext.pdf, (accessed on 18th December 2014).

12Ibid. 13SCAAP partner countries in 1964 included Botswana, Cameroon, Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi, Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe. 7 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation

ITEC in the 21st Century With the turn of the 21st century, as India’s economy liberalised, India’s economic growth combined with its broadening geo-strategic interests led to a rapid increase in India’s engagement with other countries through development assistance. Since 2001, India’s engagement through ITEC has correspondingly seen a marked rise.14 In 2001, 1,700 participants were offered ITEC training slots. By 2012-13, this number had risen to nearly 8,000 candidates from 158 countries. And by 2014-15, ITEC had grown further to offer training to 10,000 candidates from 161 countries.

Map 1: Distribution of ITEC slots worldwide in 2012-13

Legend Distribution of India's ITEC slots, 2012-13

No ITEC slots were offered Countries that received between 1 - 20 ITEC slots Countries that received between 21 - 50 ITEC slots Countries that received between 51 - 100 ITEC slots Countries that received between 101 - 200 ITEC slots Countries that received between 201 - 675 ITEC slots

Source: Data collated by the Indian Development Cooperation Research initiative, at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi from publically available sources on ITEC

India’s ITEC programme continues to be a cost-effective way of sharing development experiences and boosting bilateral relations. Between 2011-12 and 2013-14, the average cost of training one candidate during a 7-8 week ITEC course conducted in English was approximately US$ 2,800.15 This included the cost for airfare, accommodation, food and living expenses. Training a foreign student through a similar 7-8 week course at most institutions in the United States or the United Kingdom in 2015 would cost at least ten times more. The cost-effectiveness of the ITEC programme is due to the greater purchasing power of a dollar in India versus developed countries. It is also due to the fact that most ITEC courses are conducted at national institutes in India, where food and accommodation costs remain heavily subsidized and are often calculated at the same rates they were set at the inception of the course – whether that was in the 1960s or in the 1990s. Moreover, ITEC’s rapid growth has not eroded the programme’s flexibility. As the country profiles of IDCR’s study will highlight, India continues to offer specialized ITEC courses at the request of ITEC partner countries, indicating that ITEC remains adaptable and responsive to a country’s specific needs. ITEC’s cost- effectiveness combined with its flexibility will likely allow the programme to play an increasingly important role in India’s growing efforts to build capacity abroad in the 21st century. Suggestions for further strengthening ITEC As India continues to rise economically, its strategic interests in the Indo-Pacific region and beyond are likely to grow. And as India’s strategic interests broaden and deepen, India is very likely to continue augmenting its already substantial engagement through development partnerships in which ITEC will continue to play an important role.16

14See Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, ‘Keynote address by Foreign Secretary at the Conference of Southern Providers “South-South Cooperation: Issues and Emerging Challenges”,’15th April 2013, available at Statements. http://www.mea.gov.in/Speecheshtm?dtl/21549/Keynote+address+by+Foreign+Secretary+at+Conference+of+Southern+Providers+SouthSouth+Cooperation++Issues+and +Emerging+Challen es (accessed 30th October, 2014). 15Calculations made by the Indian Development Cooperation Research initiative at the Centre for Policy, New Delhi, based on publically available data. 16See for example Rani D. Mullen ‘5 Predictions for India’s Development Cooperation Under the New Government,’ InAsia Blog, The Asia Foundation, 28th May, 2014. Available at http://asiafoundation.org/in-asia/2014/05/28/5-predictions-for-indias-development-cooperation-under-new-government/ (accessed 30th October, 2014). The History and Evolution of the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) program 8

India’s ITEC training programme is already a significant aspect of India’s development cooperation partnerships. It would be further enhanced and become more relevant in today’s globalized world if greater Indian private sector participation in the design and delivery of ITEC training programmes was encouraged. ITEC’s focus on training largely government officials has largely stemmed from the understanding that government officials with favourable perceptions of India could prove advantageous as India seeks stronger bilateral relations with a given country.17 However, training of government officials in private institutes does not lessen this possible advantage.

India could also take steps to address the administrative inefficiencies that frequently affect ITEC’s functioning. For example, institutes often do not receive payments from the MEA for the ITEC courses they conduct in a timely manner. Ensuring payments are disbursed in a timely manner could help the ITEC institute more comprehensively plan course-related activities such as study tours and field visits for the incoming batch of ITEC participants. Figure 3: Regional distribution of ITEC slots, 2013-14

Regional distribution of select ITEC slots in 2013-14 The regions listed below and in the pie chart are the same categorisations that appear in the Ministry of External Affairs' Annual Reports. Data on country-wise distribution of ITEC slots in 2013-14 is available for 7,538 slots out of the nearly 10,000 ITEC slots that India offered in 2013-14. Details of the regions listed in the pie chart Caucasus: Georgia Eurasia: Armenia, Belarus, Ukraine West Asia: Iran, Jordan, Lebanon, Palestine, Syria Gulf Countries: Bahrain, Iraq, Oman, Yemen Central Asia: Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan South Asia: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Maldives, Nepal, Sri Lanka South East Asia: Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Vietnam East Asia: Mongolia Pacific Islands: Cook Island, Fiji, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Tuvalu Caribbean: Barbados, Cuba, Dominica, Haiti, Jamaica, Nicaragua, Saint Lucia, Suriname Latin America: Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana, Honduras, Paraguay, Peru Central America: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala Europe: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Lithuania, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia Africa: Angola, Benin, Botswana, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Cape Verde, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Democratic Republic of Congo, Cote d'Ivoire, Djibouti, Egypt, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Madagascar, Malawi, Mali, Mauritania, Mauritius, Morocco, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Senegal, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Tunisia, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe

Source: Data collated by the Indian Development Cooperation Research initiative, at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi from publically available sources.

Further, the process of nominating ITEC candidates from countries is often cumbersome. For example, the process in Myanmar presently involves three organizations in Myanmar, in addition to the Indian mission in Yangon, the ITEC institute in India, and the Development Partnership Administration (DPA-II) at the Indian Ministry of External Affairs. Coordination among these agencies is often a time-consuming process, leading to a delay in processing nominations. Frequently these delays result in ITEC slots going unused. In Myanmar and other countries where bureaucratic processes are particularly cumbersome, India should consider streamlining the application process in consultation with the concerned ITEC partner country, for example by allowing various government ministries to send nominations directly to the Indian Embassy and having the Indian embassy finalize ITEC participation.

17 IDCR interview with a former official from the Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, 24th July, 2014. 9 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation

India should also consider providing a diploma to ITEC participants in addition to a certificate of attendance. As is presently the practice, a certificate of attendance could continue to be given to all ITEC students, while a new diploma certification could be given to those students who successfully pass a test, thereby encouraging a more comprehensive assimilation of course material.18 Furthermore, to encourage the participation of non-English speakers, India could consider providing a translation and interpretation system. Finally, data on ITEC in the public domain remains limited. Considering that ITEC has been a successful programme, which has allowed India to share its development experiences with numerous developing countries, India should make more efforts to publicize these successes, while also increasing transparency of information on the number of slots and courses offered and utilised under the ITEC programme. Greater public information on ITEC, more ITEC partner country information, and a better sense of ITEC community could also be fostered through the use of social media and websites to help ITEC alumni keep in touch with each other. Looking forward, as New Delhi’s development assistance programme grows, ITEC will almost certainly continue to play an important role in strengthening India’s bilateral relations with a growing number of ITEC partner countries. Addressing some of ITEC’s shortcomings through the measures highlighted above could help India more effectively leverage the ITEC programme to realise the many economic and geo- strategic aspirations India shares with its development partners.

Figure 4: Select ITEC slot recipients, 2013-14

Source: Data collated by the Indian Development Cooperation Research initiative, at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi from publically available sources.

18This suggestion will not apply to those enrolling at Barefoot College, but many other institutes IDCR interacted with highlighted that testing students could significantly improve the quality of training imparted through ITEC. Country Profiles IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation 10

Afghanistan

India and Afghanistan have centuries-old historical ties, which provided a strong foundation for both nations to strengthen their relationship in the period following India’s independence in 1947. By the 1970s, India offered Afghanistan the largest number of ITEC training programme slots, as well as deputation of Indian experts. In addition to technical training, Afghanistan also received considerable development assistance in other areas. During the 1970s, India helped Afghanistan set up a children’s hospital in Kabul. India also undertook restoration work of the Khwaja Parsa Mosque in northwest Afghanistan and gifted a radio isotope dispensing unit to Kabul University.

Though the political circumstances in the 1980s and 1990s would test the bilateral relationship,19 in the post-September 2001 period, with the ouster of the extremist Taliban government from Afghanistan, India and Afghanistan have continued to draw closer, with the shared objective of ensuring a politically and economically stable Afghanistan.

New Delhi’s bilateral relationship with Afghanistan is driven by an understanding that a democratic and prosperous Afghanistan bodes well for India’s political and security interests, as well as for India’s interests in securing access to the resource-rich regions of Afghanistan and Central Asia. As India sought to realise broader geo-strategic and economic interests through building strong, mutually beneficial development partnerships with Afghanistan, New Delhi committed over US$ 2 billion in grants and Lines of Credit (LOCs) to Afghanistan between 2004 and 2012. Only Bhutan has received a greater volume of Indian development assistance over the same period. As of 2015, Afghanistan continued to be the second largest recipient of Indian foreign assistance. India’s engagement with Afghanistan through ITEC is not particularly recent. As early as 1969, under the ITEC programme—India deputed a group of experts to Afghanistan to help develop the country’s human resources.20 Throughout the 1970s, India’s development partnership with Afghanistan had a strong focus on deputing ITEC experts. Figure 5: ITEC slots to Afghanistan compared to other countries, 2012-13 For example, in 1976-77, of the 230 experts India deputed abroad under ITEC, 124 were deputed to Afghanistan. Yet, while the number of Indian experts sent to Afghanistan through the ITEC programme was high, the number of Afghans coming to India under the ITEC programme remained low throughout the 1970s and 1980s. India’s support for the Soviet backed regime in Kabul during the early 1980s led to a deterioration of the bilateral relationship. However, India remained engaged with

Source: Calculations by the Indian Development Research Cooperation (IDCR) initiative at the Centre for Policy Research, Afghanistan during the civil New Delhi, based on data from publically available sources such as MEA Annual Reports, Outcome Budgets, etc. war in the late 1980s and the e a r ly 1 9 9 0 s , p rov i d i n g

19See footnote 17, and See Rani D. Mullen, ‘The India-Afganistan Partnership’ India Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) Project, Bilateral Brief no. 2, 16th May 2013 (last updated 16th May, 2013). Available at http://idcr.cprindia.org/blog/india-afghanistan-partnership(accessed 30th October, 2014).

20 Further details on the activities of this group of experts are not available in the public domain. See Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India ‘Annual Report, 1969-70,’ available at http://mealib.nic.in/?pdf2496?000 (accessed 30th October, 2014) 11 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation

Figure 6: ITEC slots to Afghanistan, 2003/04 to 2013/14

Discretionary Slots 258

675 675

500 500 500 500 500 500

300

102 50

2003-04 2004-05 2005-06 2006-07 2007-08 2008-09 2009-10 2010-11 2011-12 2012-13 2013-14

Afghanistan grants and humanitarian assistance through the United Nations. Notably, during the 1980s and the early 1990s, ITEC training to Afghanistan continued in sectors like public health and education, though few slots were offered. With the rise of the Taliban in 1994, Indian began routing humanitarian assistance to Afghanistan through international agencies and Afghanistan was extended very limited ITEC slots between 1995 and 2001.21

Resumption of training under ITEC

Along with a resumption of India’s development partnership with Afghanistan following the defeat of the Taliban in 2001, there was a renewed focus in the bilateral relationship on training and economic cooperation under the ITEC programme. At the January 2002 Tokyo Donors Conference, India pledged $100 million to Afghanistan, including 50 ITEC slots. By 2004, Indian aid commitments to Afghanistan had risen to $400 million, including 102 ITEC training slots, while by 2006 the ITEC slots offered had increased ten-fold from 2002, to 500 slots.

As of 2014-15, India offers 675 ITEC training slots annually to Afghanistan. India also extends an additional 258 ‘discretionary’ ITEC slots to various ministries in the Afghan government. Depending on the skills a particular ministry is looking to develop, these discretionary slots can be used by the Afghan government to nominate staff for specific ITEC courses, ranging from agricultural development to information technology. Including the discretionary ITEC slots, India presently offers Afghanistan 933 ITEC slots, making Afghanistan by far the largest partner in the ITEC programme.

Large variety of training under ITEC

By the end of 2014, the demand for assistance in human resource development across a range of branches of the Afghan government remained high. In response to the strong demand, India in 2014-15 offered Afghans 215 different types of ITEC courses in subjects ranging from election management, defence training, business management, information technology, HIV prevention, and English proficiency. Under ITEC, Afghan National Army personnel have been trained at prestigious Indian military institutes like the National Defence Academy in Pune, the Defence Services Staff College in Ooty and the Indian Military

21Data in the public domain indicates that between 1994-95 and 2000-01, Afghanistan was offered 2 ITEC slots. Data on whether these slots were utilized is not publically available. Country Profile : Afghanistan 12

Academy in Dehradun; Afghan diplomats have been trained at the Indian Foreign Services Institute; senior election management officials have been trained at the India International Institute of Democracy and Election Management; and Afghan women have received training in basic solar energy technologies.

ITEC slot utilization

ITEC slot utilization in Afghanistan has averaged 87 percent between 2006 and 2011. This is comparable to slot utilization in other countries that receive a high number of ITEC slots like Myanmar, where ITEC slot utilization between 2006 and 2011 averaged around 89 percent.22

Conclusion & suggestions for further increasing the ITEC programme

By the beginning of 2015, India’s ITEC programme was a significant part of India’s bilateral relationship with Afghanistan. It currently offers the largest number of ITEC training slots to Afghan government officials for training through a large variety of courses.

Yet the training programmes have been geared towards training mid-level government officials, with only a few scholarships available to private sector candidates. In order for ITEC to make a more significant contribution to Afghanistan’s nation-building efforts, India should consider broadening the programme to encourage greater private participation. A larger focus on Afghanistan’s bourgeoning private sector would not only prove advantageous to Afghanistan, but would result in greater opportunities for India to foster strong people-to-people contacts with the Afghan private sector. And though many mechanisms exist to spur trade between Afghanistan and India, by broadening the scope of ITEC, the greater people to people contacts that the programme often fosters would support India and Afghanistan’s efforts to build closer ties.

22Data on ITEC slots and utilization from the Embassy of India in Myanmar, accessible here at http://www.indiaembassyyangon.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=65&Itemid=194&lang=en (accessed 28th January 2015). 13 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation

Bhutan In 1949 Bhutan entered into the Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation with newly independent India. The treaty reaffirmed shared cultural and historical ties and mutual non-interference in each other’s internal affairs, while stating that Bhutan would be “guided” by the advice of the Indian government with regard to its external affairs.23 By stating that India would also provide an annual financial assistance to Bhutan, the treaty provided a framework through which India could assist Bhutan as it sought to bolster capacity across a variety of sectors. This treaty was updated in 2007, when both countries signed the India-Bhutan Friendship Treaty.

Sixty-five years later, in June 2014, the newly-elected Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made his first visit abroad to Thimphu, highlighting Bhutan's continued relevance to Indian foreign policy. The warm reception he received in Bhutan also reflected the generally close relations between these two countries.

India’s longest and financially largest development partnership

India’s development partnership with Bhutan has the longest history out of India’s development partnerships, with the first development assistance being provided in 1949, just a couple of years after India’s independence. India has also been the largest source of foreign aid for Bhutan. Since the early years of the development partnership, the bulk of India’s development assistance efforts to Bhutan have been through grants for improving medical infrastructure, airport development, information technology development, constructing of hydropower plants, providing fuel subsidies and undertaking rail link projects in particular. Bhutan has also been the largest recipient of Indian development assistance. For example, between 2009-10 and 2014-15, Bhutan received over 50 percent of the total development assistance grants India extended. Figure 8: ITEC slot utilization in Bhutan in 2013-14 Continued strong ITEC training programme

217 3 In addition to grants and Lines of Credit (LOCs), India has engaged with Bhutan to develop its human resources across a variety of sectors. India’s training ITEC slots utilized Unutilized ITEC slots efforts with Bhutan began in the 1960s through the Technical Cooperation Scheme of the Colombo Plan,

Source: Calculations by the Indian Development Research Cooperation (IDCR) initiative at the Centre of which Bhutan was a member nation. India started for Policy Research, New Delhi, based on data from publically available sources on the ITEC program. to offer Bhutan training slots under the regular ITEC programme much later, with 20 slots offered in 2000 which grew to 80 slots by 2004.24 ITEC slots offered to Bhutan have also increased significantly over the past decade. As of 2014-15, India offers Bhutan 260 training slots annually through ITEC and the Technical Cooperation Scheme of the Colombo Plan. In 2013-14, Bhutan utilized nearly 99 percent of the 220 ITEC slots it was offered.

Bilateral ITEC trainee selection

Management of the ITEC programme for Bhutan and Bhutanese ITEC trainee selection is coordinated between both countries. The Human Resources Division of Bhutan primarily coordinates with the Development Partnership Administration (DPA-II) at the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) to manage the ITEC programme. Popular courses include information technology, agriculture, public administration, and, more recently, election management.

23 The full text of the Treaty of Friendship and Cooperation between India and Bhutan is available at http://www.refworld.org/docid/3ae6b4d620.html, (accessed 12th January 2015). 24 Bhutan is among the few countries where private sector participation in ITEC is welcome. The Bhutan Chamber of Commerce and Industry regularly advertises ITEC courses for the private and corporate sectors. Management education for senior executives at the Administrative Staff College in Hyderabad and entrepreneurship development at the Entrepreneurship Development Institute in Ahmedabad are among the more popular courses among Bhutanese private sector participants. Country Profile : Bhutan 14

The first course in election management was offered to Bhutan in 2013 and is notable, since the circumstances that led to Bhutan being offered the course highlight the flexibility of the ITEC programme, as well as ITEC’s responsiveness to a country’s specific needs. In 2012, a Memorandum of Understanding to train mid- level Bhutanese polling officials was signed between the Election Commission of Bhutan and the Election Commission of India. When the Election Commission of India began conducting training courses for international candidates in 2013 - recognising the proposed course had the potential to be mutually beneficial to India and numerous developing countries, including Bhutan - the MEA appointed the India International Institute of Democracy and Election Management (IIIDEM - the training institute of the Election Commission of India) as an ITEC partner. Subsequently, Bhutanese election management officials (along with officials from Ghana, Lesotho, and Georgia) were given an opportunity to come to IIIDEM as ITEC scholars in 2013-14 to observe and draw lessons from the largest exercise in democracy in the world.

Conclusions & suggestions

Helping its neighbours develop human resources has long been a priority for India, and an increasing development cooperation budget indicates that India's commitment to capacity building continues to grow stronger. Given that India is Bhutan’s traditional development partner, more ITEC training slots for Bhutan in the field of hydropower would be commensurate with the mutually shared vision of generating 10,000 MW of hydropower by 2020. India could further consider offering more training slots to train Bhutanese in other forms of renewable energy like solar power at institutes like the Solar Energy Centre and TERI in New Delhi. As India’s development partnerships with Bhutan continue to grow through grants, LOCs, and educational scholarships, ITEC’s ability to adapt and respond to Bhutan’s changing needs makes it very likely that India’s flagship training programme will continue to play an important role in Bhutan’s development. Chile An emerging ITEC partner

Chile became an ITEC partner country nearly a decade ago, in 2005. Although India extended only four ITEC slots to Chile in 2005, Chile’s response to New Delhi’s capacity building efforts was encouraging. Subsequently, recognising the demand for short-term training courses among Chileans, and the positive impact extending ITEC slots to Chile could have on spurring bilateral trade and people to people to contacts,25 India began steadily increasing ITEC slots to Chile. From the four slots offered to Chile in 2005, ITEC slots were increased to 25 in 2010, and further to 35 in 2011. Figure 9: ITEC slots to Chile, 2006-07 to 2013-14 Despite having a higher per capita income than India, the growing number of ITEC slots to predominantly Chilean engineers, technicians and scientists indicates that Chileans see India’s skill development programme as an avenue of development cooperation that adds considerable value to Chile’s capacity building efforts. The ITEC training slots offered to Chile are also indicative of the larger bilateral relationship which is increasingly focusing on renewable energy. Over the past few years India Source: Data collated by the Indian Development Cooperation Research initiative, at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi from publically available sources. has developed low-cost renewable energy technology. Chile, which has been keen to diversify its energy base, has used most of the ITEC slots available to gain expertise for setting up renewable energies in their country.

25IDCR email correspondence with the Indian embassy in Santiago, Chile, August 2014. 15 Country Profile : Chile

Growing number of ITEC slots and diversity of courses offered

As the number of ITEC slots extended to Chile increased, the subjects in which ITEC courses were offered also diversified. In addition to the course in information technology that has been offered since 2005 and the recent focus on low-cost renewable energy technologies, as of 2014, prospective ITEC students from Chile can also choose from courses in English proficiency, banking, urban development, agricultural sciences, among others. Figure 10: ITEC slot utilization in Chile, 2005-06 to 2013-14 The ITEC programme also gives Chileans an opportunity to experience India’s cultural diversity and dynamism first hand. The Indian 180 7 Embassy in Chile notes that ITEC students have contributed to a deeper understanding between the people of India and Chile, indicating that the ITEC slots utilized Unutilized ITEC slots first-hand exposure to India through ITEC has helped strengthen the India-Chile relationship.26 Source: Calculations by the Indian Development Research Cooperation (IDCR) initiative at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, based on data from publically available sources on the ITEC program.

ITEC supports larger Indo-Chilean relationship

As India and Chile seek closer ties, one way both nations could strengthen bilateral relations is by cultivating deeper development partnerships through ITEC. That Chile will welcome closer engagement through ITEC is almost certain since between 2005 and 2013 over 95 percent of the ITEC scholarships extended to Chile were utilized. The demand for ITEC scholarships is also growing among staff from private universities and business chambers in Chile -- demands that India cannot adequately cater to at present.27

Conclusion & suggestions

The overall focus on the ITEC programme for Chile has been to enhance Chilean capacity building, develop human resources, and promote overall technical cooperation between the two countries, particularly in the area of renewable energy resources.28 Offering more ITEC slots for Chile’s private sector and scientists in the renewable energy sector would give Chileans an opportunity to learn from India’s own socio-economic development experiences, which could prove mutually beneficial to growing trade and mutually supportive political relationship between India and Chile. In addition to opening new avenues for trade and people-to-people exchanges, stronger ties through ITEC could result in both nations more actively exploring new avenues of cooperation and more effectively addressing the common developmental challenges they face.

26Information provided by the Embassy of India in Santiago, Chile to IDCR.

27Ibid

28Ministry of External Affairs Facebook page, available at https://www.facebook.com/MEAINDIA/posts/851840661504400 (accessed January 10, 2015). IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation 16 Ethiopia India and Ethiopia have had a trade relationship dating back centuries. After India’s independence and following the visit of Ethiopia’s King Haile Selassie to India in 1956, many Indian schoolteachers immigrated to Ethiopia.29 These teachers played an important role as Ethiopia rapidly modernised its education system during the 1950s and 1960s.30 The interactions between Indian teachers and a generation of Ethiopian students also reinforced the bilateral relationship between the two countries, deepening the development partnership between them. India’s formal aid engagement with Ethiopia began less than a decade after India’s independence, when in 1955, India helped establish the Gandhi Memorial Hospital and the Harar Military Academy in Ethiopia. In 1969, Ethiopia became an ITEC partner country and India began to aid capacity building efforts in Ethiopia.31 Figure 11: ITEC slots to Ethiopia, 2006-07 to 2013-14 As India’s development assistance programme grew, India’s engagement with Ethiopia through development partnerships increased, particularly since the turn of the 21st century. While the volume of grants remain low, in 2014-2015 India’s engagement with Ethiopia through Lines of Credit has been exceptionally strong. Between 2004 and 2013, India extended LOCs worth over US$ 1 billion to Ethiopia, making the east African country the largest recipient of Indian LOCs in Africa. Indian LOCs to Source: Calculations by the Indian Development Research Cooperation (IDCR) initiative at the Ethiopia have largely been directed Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi, based on data from publically available sources towards modernising the country’s sugar industry and to help Ethiopia build more efficient energy transmission networks. A major African ITEC partner country The early development partnership between India and Ethiopia is also seen in Ethiopia receiving ITEC training slot allocations in 1969, just five years after the programme was established. However, between 1969 and 2006, India’s engagement with Ethiopia through ITEC remained modest, with ITEC slots increasing from 5 to 25 during this time.32 Then, following the 2007 visit of India’s External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna to Ethiopia, ITEC slots offered to Ethiopia increased rapidly, doubling between 2006 and 2007 from 25 to 50. The two India-Africa Forum Summits (IAFS), held in 2008 and 2011 respectively, highlighted that the demand for ITEC slots in Ethiopia was still far greater than the ITEC slots India offered. Subsequently, in 2012-13, India increased ITEC slots to Ethiopia to 125 and further to 225 in 2014-15. The demand-driven nature of the ITEC programme combined with the diversity of courses on offer has allowed Ethiopia to choose ITEC courses according to its development-based needs. Between 2006 and 2014, more than 650 Ethiopians have been trained under ITEC in sectors as diverse as small and medium- scale industrial development, food processing, fashion designing, diplomacy, mass communication, banking, and information technology.33

29 Abraham Verghese, "Once upon a life", The Guardian, 11th April 2010, available at http://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2010/apr/11/abraham-verghese-ethiopia- coup-1973 (last accessed 30th October, 2014). 30Aparajita Gupta, “Ethiopia Once Again Looks to Indian Teachers,” IANS, April 7th, 2014 ava i l a b l e a t http:/ /mea.gov.in/ a r t i c l e s - i n - f o re i g n - media.htm?dtl/23179/Ethiopia+once+again+looks+to+Indian+teachers (last accessed 30th October, 2014). 31 See Gedion S Jalata, “Development Assistance from the South: Comparative Analysis of Chinese and Indian aid to Ethiopia”, Chinese Studies 2014. Vol.3, No.1, 24-39, published online February 2014 in SciRes (http://www.scirp.org/journal/chnstd), available at file:///C:/Users/hemant/Downloads/ChnStd_2014022714144322%20(1).pdf 32 From the publically available data, IDCR estimates that ITEC slots extended to Ethiopia remained between 5 and 25 between 1969 and 2006. 33"Ethiopia: Indian Embassy celebrates ITEC day,” All Africa, 19th September 2003, available at http://allafrica.com/stories/200309191011.html (accessed 30th October 2014), Also see Gurjit Singh, “ITEC Programme Experience: India and Ethiopia”, March 2010, CUTS International, available at http://www.cuts- international.org/pdf/Chapter15_Gurjit_Singh.pdf, (accessed on 12th January 2015). 17 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation

The Indo-Ethiopian ITEC relationship in the 21st century

Going forward, given Ethiopia’s emphasis on capacity building in the science and technology sectors,34 one way India and Ethiopia could further strengthen bilateral ties is to offer more ITEC training in courses like information technology, tool design, and hydrology, which would dovetail neatly with Ethiopia's stated development goals. The third India-Africa Forum Summit scheduled to be held in New Delhi in 201535 could prove an ideal platform for both nations to discuss the feasibility of increasing slots in the science and technology sector. Myanmar

A development partnership based on historical ties

India has old historical ties with Myanmar, a country that once was part of larger British India. After Myanmar’s gained its independence from Britain in 1948, India established diplomatic relations with Myanmar and provided development assistance shortly thereafter. Throughout the 1950s both countries retained a close development partnership, building on their historical, cultural and trade links. However, the 1962 military coup of the democratic government led to strained bilateral ties, including in development assistance. These strains were exacerbated by the expulsion of the large Indian origin community in Myanmar. By the early 1990s a rapprochement by the Indian government led to a resumption in development cooperation between the two countries.

India’s decision to seek closer Figure 12: Indian grants, loans and ITEC to Myanmar, 2000-01 to 2013-14 ties with Myanmar stemmed 5000 largely from a recognition that a 4500 policy of engagement rather 4000 than isolation would not only 3500 n o

i 3000 bode well for India’s growing l l i 2500

economic and geo-strategic M

R 2000

interests in Southeast Asia, but N I would also increase the chances 1500 of democracy taking root in 1000 500 Myanmar. 3 6 And as India’s 0 relationship with Myanmar began to thaw, India’s engagement with Myanmar through development partnerships grew stronger. Source: Calculations by IDCR based on the India Budget 2000/01 to 2013/14 Between 2000 and 2010, India committed nearly INR 5 billion (approximately US$ 110 million) in grants and over US$ 300 million as Lines of Credit (LOCs) to Myanmar. Notably, since the military junta made efforts to steer Myanmar towards a path of inclusive governance through reforms enacted in 2011, India’s engagement with Myanmar has grown even faster. Grants committed by India rose from INR 213.2 million in 2007-08 to INR 674 million in 2011-12 and further to INR 4.5 billion in 2013-14, largely in the transport and agricultural sectors.

34See Message of H.E Demitu Hambisa, Minister of Science and Technology, Government of Ethiopia, available at http://www.most.gov.et/(last accessed 30th October, 2014).

35 The India-Africa Forum Summit was scheduled to be held in December 2014, but has been postponed to 2015. See DevirupaMitra ‘Ebola Scare Pushes India-Africa Summit to 2015,’ The New Indian Express, 21st September, 2014 available at http://www.newindianexpress.com/thesundaystandard/Ebola-Scare-Pushes-India-Africa-Summit-to- 2015/2014/09/21/article2441381.ece (last accessed 12th January 2015)

36 See for example The Asia Society, 'From Isolation to Engagement: Reviewing India’s Policy toward Myanmar,' in Current Realities and Future Possibilities in Burma/Myanmar: Perspectives from Asia, March 2010, pp. 35-48, available at http://www2.jiia.or.jp/pdf/report/201003/BurmaMyanmar_NationalReviews.pdf (last Accessed 30th October, 2014). Also see ‘India-Myanmar Relations,’ in Indian Development Cooperation Research Initiative report ‘The State of Indian Development Cooperation,’ spring 2014, p.17 (available at http://cprindia.org/Spring_2014_IDCR_Report_the_State_of_Indian_DevelAopment_Cooperation.pdf) (last accessed 30th October, 2014). Country Profile : Myanmar 18

2nd largest ITEC partner As the grants and LOCs India extended to Myanmar increased, India’s capacity building efforts through ITEC also witnessed a remarkable rise. Compared to the 30 ITEC slots that Myanmar was offered in 1996, as of 2014-15, it is offered 525 slots annually, making Myanmar the second largest recipient of ITEC scholarships, after Afghanistan. Figure 13: ITEC slots to Myanmar, 2006-07 to 2013-14 The ITEC programme in Myanmar has largely focused on building administrative capacity among government officials. Between 2000 and 2014, nearly 1,500 Burmese—largely public servants—have come to India as ITEC scholars to hone their skills in information technology, e- governance, election management, rural development, sustainable development, and women’s empowerment.

Though the ITEC programme in Source: Embassy of India in Yangon Myanmar is largely geared towards training government officials, Myanmar’s nodal agency for coordinating the ITEC programme, the Ministry of National Planning and Economic Development, has also started receiving applications from NGOs and voluntary organizations, reflecting the broadening demand for ITEC in Myanmar. ITEC students from Myanmar increasingly come from NGOs such as the Myanmar Women's Affairs Federation, the Myanmar Women and Child Development Federation, and the Myanmar Women Entrepreneurs’ Association. In addition to India’s grants and LOCs that focus on building better road and rail networks in Myanmar, India’s assistance through ITEC courses in e-governance, and election management continues to help strengthen Myanmar’s institutional capacity. With India’s efforts towards bolstering transparency in public service delivery in Myanmar, Myanmar can hope to more easily address the reservations other countries might have towards deeper economic engagement with a nation that has been largely closed to the outside world for over 40 years. Suggestions for further strengthening the ITEC programme A politically transparent and economically vibrant Myanmar that is better connected to broader parts of Southeast Asia will also have welcome implications for India’s broader economic and geo-strategic interests. And though the many dove-tailing interests between India and Myanmar have resulted in a rapidly growing development assistance programme in Myanmar, concerning ITEC, there is considerable administrative inefficiency that needs to be addressed. The process of nominating ITEC candidates from Myanmar presently involves three organizations in Myanmar in addition to the Indian mission in Yangon, the ITEC institute, and the DPA at the Indian Ministry of External Affairs. Myanmar’s Ministry of National Planning and Economic Development receives nominations for potential ITEC candidates from government ministries and NGOs. It forwards these names to Myanmar’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which then sends a list to the Indian embassy in Yangon. Coordination between the Indian embassy in Yangon, the MEA in New Delhi and the ITEC institute adds to an already lengthy bureaucratic process that often leads to a delay in processing nominations which can result in ITEC slots going unused. To make India’s engagement through ITEC more effective, India and Myanmar could consider streamlining the application process, perhaps by allowing various government ministries in Myanmar to directly send nominations to the Indian embassy in Yangon. 19 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation Namibia Strong bilateral ties predating independence

India was one of the earliest and most vocal supporters of the Namibian liberation movement. Recognising the national liberation party SWAPO (South-West Africa People’s Organization) as the sole representative of the people of South-West Africa as early as 1981, India urged the party to establish its first diplomatic outpost abroad in New Delhi, which SWAPO did in 1986, nearly four years before Namibia gained its independence in 1990. Namibia attained independence in 1990 and the Indian prime minister and other high-ranking politicians attended the independence celebrations. India also converted its observer mission into a full High Commission in 1990. Since then, India has maintained close relations with Namibia and supported human resource development through its general development partnership.

Map 2: ITEC slots to Africa in 2005-06

Namibia 55

Map created by the Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) initiative based on information available from MEA Annual Report 2005-06

Important ITEC/SCAAP partner in Africa

Namibia became an ITEC/SCAAP partner soon after its independence in 1990 and during the 1990s approximately 100 Namibians visited India through the ITEC programme. India’s ITEC programme for Namibia has been focused on building up the human resources within the young country, by supporting skills development, higher education, and institutionalisation of affirmative action programmes. By the early 21st century over 55 Namibians were receiving training in India annually through the ITEC programme, several of them high-ranking government officials. For example, in 2001-2002, 57 Namibian nationals received ITEC training in India, including senior officials from the president and prime minister’s office, as well as a town mayor. Country Profile : Namibia 20

Namibia continued to send around 55 nationals annually for ITEC training through 2010. This made the relatively small southern African nation of 2 million people India’s sixth largest ITEC partner in Africa.

As of 2013, over 700 Namibian ITEC: A View from Namibia nationals benefited from the ITEC programme, undergoing training in “As a young woman, who likes exploring…and traveling, I felt this courses that range from information technology, English proficiency, and was a lifetime experience to apply for the ITEC program [sic]. journalism to food processing. Over Before the ITEC program, I thought India was a small country with the last decade, ITEC scholarships to few people, but that was not the case. And though language was a Namibia have only grown, and with constraint (as I assumed all Indians are fluent in English) it was 125 slots offered as of 2014-15, enjoyable to…learn a bit of Hindi.” Namibia continues to be among the most important ITEC partner - Johanna S.T Kapenda, Aptech Limited, New Delhi, 2013-14 countries in Africa.

Aside from playing a key role in boosting capacity in vital sectors in Namibia, ITEC has had the very welcome effect of exposing students to India’s rich culture, further allowing Namibian entrepreneurs, journalists, civil society members, and government officials to forge lasting ties with people in India who share their interests. As the present High Commissioner of Namibia to India H.E. Pius Dunaiski notes, such interactions have often paved the way for more opportunities for trade, business, and intellectual exchanges.37

Figure14: ITEC slots to Namibia compared to other countries, 2012-13 The ITEC programme also deputes experts to Namibia. The India- Namibia Plastic Technology Namibia Demonstration Centre (INPTC) was set up with the help of ITEC funds and deputed Indian experts. As of December 2013, two ITEC experts were on deputation to the Namibian Ministry of Defence to a ssist in t he in forma t ion technology sector. Another ITEC expert was on deputation to the Namibian Institute of Public Administration and Management.38

Source: Calculations by the Indian Development Research Cooperation (IDCR) initiative at the Centre for Policy Research, New Delhi based on data from publically available sources on the ITEC programme. By deputing experts to Namibia, India’s capacity building efforts in this southern African nation have benefited many more people at a fairly minimal cost to India.

37 IDCR interview with HE Pius Dunaiski, Embassy of Namibia, New Delhi, July 2014.

38 This is the most recent date for which information on deputation of experts to Namibia is publically available. 21 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation Papua New Guinea

India has had diplomatic relations with Papua New Guinea (PNG) since the independence of PNG from Australia in 1975. India opened an embassy in PNG, an island nation of 7 million people located in the South Pacific Ocean nearly 5,500 miles from New Delhi, in 1996 and both countries have worked together in international forums, including the United Nations. They also have a growing development partnership, with India contributing to Papua New Guinea’s human resource development in particular. As part of an Indian initiative on regional assistance for island countries in the Pacific, PNG has received grants since 2008 in the form of equipment and materials for social and medical development programmes in addition to humanitarian aid and disaster relief.39 Development partnerships for mutual benefit For PNG, a country like India, which is seeking low-cost renewable energy sources and improved IT technology, the interest in forging closer ties with New Delhi is easy to understand. As PNG seeks innovative climate change adaptation strategies, better IT capabilities, and sophisticated law enforcement tools and techniques, India’s own experiences in low-cost renewable energy, IT, and forensics among other fields can prove considerably beneficial to the island nation. Figure 15: ITEC Slots to Papua New Guinea, 2006-07 to 2013-14 As part of India’s development partnership engagement with Pacific Island countries, India offered grants-in-aid to PNG worth US$ 0.6 million for supply of equipment and material for social and medical programmes for sustainable development. Further, through grant-based assistance, New Delhi helped set up an IT Centre of Excellence and three “Hole-in-the-wall"IT learning stations which were established by the Indian private sector company NIIT in partnership with the International Finance Corporation of the World Bank, to promote e-learning among economically underprivileged communities.40 India also provided funding Graph created by the Indian Development Cooperation Research (I DCR) initiative and expertise to PNG in order to help based on data from publically available sources on the ITEC program. establish 13 vocational training colleges in the island country. In addition, since PNG is prone to natural disasters like earthquakes, volcanic eruptions and tsunamis, India regularly dispatches humanitarian assistance and disaster relief to PNG.41 India’s eagerness to strengthen development partnerships through grants, Lines of Credit (LOCs), and educational scholarships with PNG could mean that New Delhi will find it easier to field a greater geo-political presence beyond its immediate neighbourhood. This could prove advantageous as India seeks markets for its goods further away from its shores.

39 See ‘India-Papua New Guinea Relations,’ available at http://www.mea.gov.in/Portal/ForeignRelation/Papua_New_Guinea.pdf (accessed 12th January 2015). 40 The Hole-in-the-wall leaning station is set up by the Hole-in-the-Wall Education Ltd.(HiWEL) is a joint venture between NIIT Ltd. and the International Finance Corporation - See more at: http://www.thebetterindia.com/2330/hiwel-spreading-computer-literacy/(accessed 12th January 2015). 41 Ibid. Country Profile : Papua New Guinea 22

Figure 16: Most popular ITEC institutes among participants from PNG in 2011-12 In addition, considering the prospects for deep-sea mining of natural resources off the coast of PNG, and India’s fast maturing deep- sea mining capabilities, closer bilateral ties could prove beneficial to India as it searches for new sources of hydrocarbons and rare earth metals to fuel its economic growth. The India-PNG ITEC partnership The 30 ITEC slots that India presently offers Papua New Guinea (PNG)—are evidence of the broadening horizons of India’s capacity building efforts. They are also evidence of a mutual desire between PNG and India for deeper development assistance-based ties. Between 1996 and 2013, over 300 students from PNG have been trained under the ITEC programme, at over 40 institutes across India. Prominent among these students have been Francis Agwi, who became the ninth commander of the Papua New Guinea Defence Force, and Moresi T. Ruahma, an ITEC scholar at the Indian Institute of Mass Communication Graph created by IDCR from publically available data. in 2002-03, who went on to become the Minister of Justice of PNG. As ITEC slots to PNG have increased from 4 in 1996, to 25 in 2010, and further to 30 in 2011, the diversity of courses on offer has also increased considerably. Courses offered in 1996-97 focused on educational planning and small business development. By contrast, as of 2011, courses offered include law enforcement, remote sensing, advanced computing, small business development, intellectual property rights, and forensics, among others. Training through ITEC for illiterate grandmothers In March 2014, to foster the spread of clean energy, India welcomed the first group of elderly women from PNG to the ‘Solar Mamas’ programme at the Barefoot College in the Indian state of Rajasthan. The Solar Mamas programme aims to train elderly, often illiterate, women from rural communities around the world to install solar-powered lanterns. On returning to their villages, the women also assume responsibility for the repair and maintenance of the solar units. Drawing power from a central grid can often prove a challenge for the many remote villages in PNG. Solar lanterns are a simple way to bring light to many villages, obviating the need for large investments in power plants and transmission systems. The women who recently finished the six-month course at the Barefoot College will likely prove a welcome addition to PNG's efforts to foster the spread of clean, off-grid lighting systems, further yielding broader benefits as they encourage communities nearby to adopt similar environmentally sustainable technologies. Suggestions & conclusions The Solar Mamas project also highlights how India’s capacity building efforts in PNG can foster goodwill towards India. As the trainers at the Barefoot College remarked, training a grandmother makes it very likely that she will impart what she learns to her children and grandchildren. And, as the skills get imparted, so will the story of India. The story of India - as told by PNG students at the Barefoot College to IDCR - is of a rapidly developing nation eager to share its development experiences. As more people in PNG learn about India through ITEC and other avenues, the opportunities for trade, investment and intellectual and cultural exchanges that arise from mutually shared positive perceptions should be further encouraged by both governments, as they promise considerable benefit to both India and PNG. 23 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation Vietnam The India-Vietnam Strategic Partnership The India-Vietnam relationship has a long history dating to the Cham Empire of the 2nd Century AD. As India and Vietnam emerged from the yoke of colonialism in the 1940s, the shared history provided a strong foundation for both countries to strengthen bilateral ties.42 Since the latter half of the 20th century, the India-Vietnam relationship has been marked by fiercely independent foreign policies, and by a shared commitment to anti-colonialism and Pan-Asian nationalism.43 These shared aspirations provide an unusually strong foundation for both countries to forge deeper bilateral ties. The advantages of a stronger bilateral relationship are easy to discern. For Vietnam, closer ties with India could provide a measure of balance against American, Russian, and particularly Chinese influences in Indochina. For India, accessing new sources of energy, assuring open trade through the vital sea lines of communication in South and Southeast Asia, and the desire to maintain friendly bilateral relations in the broader Southeast Asian region undergird the importance of building closer ties with Vietnam.

Engaging with Vietnam is also part of India’s larger focus in its extended neighbourhood, particularly Southeast Asia. As India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj highlighted during her visit to Vietnam in August 2014, from ‘Looking East,’ India is increasingly seeking to ‘Act East.’ 44

Shared security concerns have also been drawing India and Vietnam closer. And though cooperation in the defence sector has been increasing—indicated most recently by the US$ 100 million LOC extended in September 2014 for the purchase of defence equipment—New Delhi retains its desire to build closer ties with Vietnam without alienating Hanoi’s neighbours. Consequently, Indian development cooperation with Vietnam has a wide focus, with an emphasis on hydropower, agriculture, and capacity building through ITEC in sectors such as information technology, financial management, English proficiency, and remote sensing. Figure 17: ITEC slots offered to Vietnam, 2010-11 to 2014-15 Long development partnership India’s larger development partnership with Vietnam dates back to the 1970s when India started extending the first of sixteen Lines of Credit totalling n e a r ly U S $ 1 5 0 m i l l i o n f o r hydroelectric power. Two further LOCs for hydroelectric power and a pumping station worth over US$20 million were also signed in 2013. Development assistance to Vietnam has also included the gift of high performance computers Graph created by IDCR from publically available data like India’s indigenously developed PARAM supercomputer. The ITEC partnership with Vietnam India’s ITEC partnership with Vietnam also dates back to the 1970s when India helped set up the Cuu Long Delta Rice Research Institute (CLRRI) by providing technical expertise and equipment to set up Vietnam’s first rice research institute. Today, the research done at this institute has helped Vietnam to compete with India and become one of the world’s largest rice exporters.

42 See for example David Brewster, “India's Strategic Partnership with Vietnam: The Search for a Diamond on the South China Sea?" Asian Security Vol. 5, no. 1 (2009), p. 39.

43See for example IDCR, "India – Vietnam Bilateral Brief,” Bilateral Brief no. 4, 5th August 2013 (last updated 16th May, 2014). Available at http://idcr.cprindia.org/blog/india- vietnam-brief (accessed 12th January 2015).

44See for example “Sushma Swaraj tells Indian envoys to Act East and not just Look East”, Economic Times, 26th August 2014, available at http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2014-08-26/news/53243802_1_india-and-asean-countries-east-asia-strategically-important-region (accessed on 14th January 2015). Country Profile : Vietnam 24

Map 3: Major NIIT training centers in Vietnam With 150 slots presently offered on an annual basis, Vietnam today is a major part of India’s ITEC programme. On the impact of India’s capacity building efforts, His Excellency Ambassador Vu Quang Diem wrote during his tenure as Vietnam’s ambassador to India: “Indian assistance in credit, education, science and technology, and many other fields contributes practically to the cause of ‘renewal’ or [what is known in Vietnam as] Doi Moi…and [Vietnam’s] striving for modernisation, industrialisation, and active international integration.”45 Such favourable perceptions — in addition to the geo- strategic interests that India and Vietnam share —make it likely that Hanoi will continue to welcome a deeper development partnership with India.

As the India-Vietnam partnership continues to mature, the opportunities for trade and business will almost certainly multiply. Already, India’s engagement with Vietnam through ITEC has bolstered the role of Indian private sector companies in Vietnam, especially in the field of information technology. Capitalizing on its association with ITEC, which likely highlighted the demand for globally competitive IT professionals in Vietnam, the Indian company NIIT opened its first IT training centre in Ho Chi Minh City in 2001. As of 2013, NIIT and Aptech (both private sector IT institutes that are providers of ITEC training) have opened nearly 80 training centres across Vietnam, offering courses in software management, software quality assurance, and e-governance. In Map created by IDCR addition, during the official visit of the General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong to India in November 2013, India agreed to help establish a Cyber Forensic laboratory in Hanoi and an IT training centre at the National Defence Academy of Vietnam.46

Suggestions & conclusions

The presence of ITEC-funded institutes like CLRRI and ITEC-empanelled private institutes like NIIT and Aptech in Vietnam exemplifies how the interactions fostered through ITEC can open new avenues for trade and commerce. Given that both India and Vietnam are seeking ways to broaden development partnerships and increase private sector investments across a variety of sectors, stronger capacity building efforts through ITEC could allow both nations to move closer towards realizing their shared aspirations.

45 See Vu Quang Diem “Vietnam and India: Scaling New Heights,” The Hindu, 5th January, 2007, available at http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-opinion/vietnam-and- india-scaling-new-heights/article1778207.ece ( accessed 30th October, 2014).

46See “Prime Minister’s Statement to the Media during the State Visit of General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam”, Press Information Bureau, Government of India, 20th November 2013, available at http://pib.nic.in/newsite/PrintRelease.aspx?relid=100748 (accessed on 14th January 2015). Institute Profiles 25 IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation

The Barefoot College Tilonia, Rajasthan The Barefoot College in Tilonia village in the Indian state of Rajasthan is in many ways unique among the 48 ITEC training institutes. While most institutes expect a certain level of formal education and English proficiency from prospective students, the Barefoot College has no such expectations. In fact, the international ‘Solar Mamas’ training programme organized at the Barefoot College under ITEC is specifically geared towards those with little formal education or English language skills. The objective of the innovative Solar Mamas programme is to train elderly, often semi-literate or illiterate women from rural communities around the world to install, repair, and maintain solar-powered lanterns. In addition, participants are taught effective rainwater harvesting methods and also learn how to make sanitary pads and mosquito nets. The programme’s focus on elderly women from developing countries stems from a Image source: Website of the Barefoot College, available at www.barefootcollege.org simple observation: grandmothers are more likely to have strong roots and higher status in their local communities. Targeting elderly women increases the chances of the training being put to use in communities where it is most needed, since these women will be less likely to use their newly acquired skills to find well-paying jobs in bigger towns or cities. A unique ITEC partner While the Barefoot College has been training elderly Indian women since the 1990s, the pilot project to train elderly women from abroad in basic solar technologies was launched in 2004-05, with support from the Asian Development Bank. Subsequently, recognizing the many ways in which the programme at the Barefoot College dovetails with the objectives of ITEC—giving numerous developing countries an opportunity to learn from India’s unique experiences in developing low-cost renewable energy technologies—the Indian Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) expressed an interest in bringing the innovative programme under the ambit of ITEC. Since 2008, the Solar Mamas programme for international participants has become an integral part of ITEC. Innovative and cost-effective training The Barefoot College trains two batches of international Solar Mamas in six-month courses that run from March to September and September to March every year. As with other ITEC courses, the MEA gives participants a monthly stipend of INR 25,000.47 Food and accommodation costs are deducted from the monthly stipend and INR 6,000 per month is given to the participants for miscellaneous expenses. Over the six months, a total of INR 60,000 (approximately US$ 1,000) is saved from the stipend, which is given to participants at the end of the course. The total cost of training, accommodation, and food for the six-month course at Barefoot College is under US$ 3,000 per participant. To conduct a similar course in the USA or UK within a similar budget would certainly prove impossible. The most recent batch of international Solar Mamas came from Papua New Guinea, Myanmar, the Philippines, Tanzania, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and Paraguay.48 As can be inferred from this group, there is considerable linguistic diversity in a classroom of Barefoot Grandmothers at Tilonia, which often makes using English as a medium of instruction problematic. Instead, sign language, colour codes and pictures are used to instruct participants on the specifics of repairing and maintaining solar lanterns.

47 The INR 25,000 monthly stipend is given by the MEA to Barefoot College as most participants don’t have bank accounts. The MEA also gives Barefoot College INR 15,000 per participant per month to cover teaching costs, the costs of the raw material for solar lanterns, as well as local transportation, and medical costs. 48 In researching this report, IDCR interacted with ITEC Solar Mamas at the Barefoot College in August 2014. Institute Profile : The Barefoot College 26

With the help of such innovative training methods, the 34 grandmothers who recently finished the six- month course at Tilonia are set to become part of a global community of over 700 Solar Mamas that come from 66 countries as diverse as Russia, Vanuatu, Bhutan and the DRC.49

Socio-economic impact of the Solar Mamas programme

The environmental impact of the Solar Mamas programme has been remarkable. The Barefoot College estimates that as of 2014, the efforts of the wider community of Solar Mamas across 66 countries reduces annual kerosene consumption by 500,000 litres.50 On average, this means that each grandmother trained at the Barefoot College is responsible for saving over 600 litres of kerosene a year.

Map 4: Map showing where ITEC Solar Mamas come from, 2008-2013 Further, a kerosene lamp in rural Africa emits, on average, 100 kg of

CO2 in less than a year, while also contributing to numerous respiratory ailments when used indoors. It is encouraging to note that as of 2012, villages across Africa where Barefoot solar engineers work have replaced at least 50 percent of kerosene lamps with solar power lights.51

There are more benefits of the Solar Mamas programme that Source: Website of the Barefoot College, available at deserve mention. A survey www.barefootcollege.org (last accessed 30th October, 2014) conducted by the Barefoot College in Ethiopia between 2006 and 2011 found that over 500 babies were safely delivered in solar-lit homes maintained by engineers trained at the Barefoot College.52 Bunker Roy, the founder of the Barefoot College, also notes that in countries like Malawi, rats, scorpions, and snakes do not enter solar-lit homes as frequently, thus reducing the risk of bites.53

Crucially, the Solar Mamas project has created employment opportunities in places that otherwise offer few remunerative prospects for illiterate, elderly women. One example is of Susanna Huis, a 2010 ITEC participant in the Solar Mamas programme who comes from a family of subsistence farmers in a remote region of Namibia. Her community consists of a total of 12 huts. Where there were understandably few prospects for gainful employment before, six months of training at the Barefoot College allowed Susanna to take on the responsibility of installing and maintaining solar lights in 100 homes in villages surrounding hers.54 For the installation and maintenance of the solar units, Susanna is paid US$ 5 per household per month—which is roughly the same monthly amount a family in her community would spend on kerosene or firewood. Part of this money goes to pay for the spare parts (shipped from the Barefoot College when required) needed for repairing solar units. But the result, as journalist Greg Williams observes, is that, “while her husband continues to farm their small [land] holding, [Susanna] is now the family breadwinner.”55

49Out of the 700 people trained under the Solar Mamas program, nearly 500 have been trained under ITEC. 50 See www.barefootcollege.org/solutions/solar-solutions/. Figure includes estimated kerosene savings in India, where 185 solar engineers have been trained as of 2014. The program organized for Indian participants is not coordinated by the MEA. 51 Ibid. 52 See Nazanin Lankarani “Generating the Unlikeliest of Heroes,” The New York Times, 18th April, 2011 (available at http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/18/business/global/18iht-rbog-barefoot-18.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0)(last accessed 30th October, 2014). 53 Ibid. 54 See Greg Williams “Disrupting Poverty: How Barefoot College is Empowering Women Through Peer-To-Peer Learning and Technology,” Wired, 7th March, 2011 (available at http://www.wired.co.uk/magazine/archive/2011/04/features/disrupting-poverty/viewall) (last accessed 30th October, 2014). 55 Ibid. 27 Institute Profile : The Barefoot College

With over 500 solar engineers trained under ITEC at the Barefoot College since 2008, there are many more stories of empowerment, highlighting the unique advantages the ITEC Solar Mamas programme has had in strengthening the role of women in rural societies.

Solar Mamas are also encouraged to foster the spread of the solar technologies they learn to use. The results can often be remarkable. In May 2014, Nancy Kanu, a 2007 Solar Mamas participant, established Sierra Leone’s first solar training centre in her village, 100 kms from Sierra Leone’s capital, Freetown.

Based on the Barefoot model, which Ms. Kanu describes as a model that teaches people “how to make light from the sun,”56 the Barefoot Women Solar Power Training Centre of Sierra Leone began training its first batch of 54 women in May 2014.

Suggestions & conclusions

There are many more stories that highlight the empowering role played by ITEC’s Solar Mamas programme. However, there is also room for improvement. In several countries, solar units remain expensive. In Sierra Leone, for instance, the 45 percent import tax levied on solar units makes them prohibitively costly. To encourage the wider adoption of solar units, the Indian government could consider further subsidizing the solar lanterns while working with other countries to lower the costs and expand the use of such renewable energy sources. India could also work through its bilateral engagements with other countries to reduce import taxes levied on renewable energy technologies.

Barefoot Women Solar Power Training Centre, Sierra Leone Encouragingly, the recommendations that emerged from IDCR’s interactions with the Solar Mamas about the ITEC programme are easy to implement. Most women highlighted they would like the classrooms to be open beyond 5 pm so they can practice what they have learned for longer. They would also like to see bigger cities nearby, be offered a varied diet, and be allowed to shop in the nearby town of Kishangarh more frequently - suggestions the MEA and the Barefoot College could consider incorporating into the programme.

Source: Twitter page of Barefoot Women Solar Power Training Centre, Sierra Leone available at https://twitter.com/slbarefootwomen/status/309357454469251072/photo/1 (last Apart from these suggestions, what came across strongly accessed 30th October 2014) through IDCR’s interactions with the grandmothers was a sense of exuberance and enthusiasm, perhaps best summarized by what 47 year old PakaKewa from Papua New Guinea had to say: “I thought only men can make this solar stuff. I came here. I found I could learn this too. This is my big story.”

Solar Mamas at the Barefoot College, Tilonia, Rajasthan

Image source: Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) initiative Image source: Website of the Barefoot College, available at www.barefootcollege.org

56Meena Bhandari ‘The women bringing solar power to Sierra Leone,’ The Mail and Guardian, 18th August, 2011, available at http://mg.co.za/article/2011-08-18-the-women- bringing-solar-power-to-sierra-leone( accessed 30th October, 2014). IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation 28 Central Institute of Tool Design Hyderabad, Telangana

Building expertise in tool design

Established in 1968, the Central Institute of Tool Design (CITD) was envisaged as a premier tool engineering institute. The institute’s initial objectives included providing advisory assistance to small- scale Indian manufacturing units and training technical personnel across India.

While CITD continued to train Indians in the 1960s and the early 1970s, India recognised that sharing CITD’s experiences and expertise in tool design could be of considerable benefit to other developing countries. Subsequently, in 1974, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) selected CITD as an ITEC partner institute.

ITEC courses and training at CITD Initially, CITD offered only a few short-term courses in industrial design and manufacturing. However, as CITD’s capacity to train ITEC students grew, the courses it offered diversified. As of 2014-15, CITD offers over 15 courses in computer-aided design and computer-aided manufacturing (CAD/CAM), low cost automation techniques, designing very large scale integration (VLSI) circuits, and mechatronics.

The ITEC courses at CITD are between six to ten weeks long and are designed keeping in mind the needs of developing countries. Therefore, practical experience is a critical part of the Institute’s training programmes. Through state-of- the-art computer numerical control (CNC) machines, lathes, and milling machines,57 ITEC participants at CITD are given valuable hands-on experience in tool designing. With a consistent commitment to a ‘hands on’ approach, between 1974 and 2014 CITD has equipped over 1,000 ITEC scholars from 82 countries with a wide range of skills in tool design, allowing them to boost manufacturing capabilities in their countries.

57Computer numerical machines (CNCs) control and automate the functions and motions of machine tools, using a computer program. They are widely used in the manufacturing industry for metal processing. Lathes are machine tools designed for machining hard materials like steel. Milling machines are an important industrial tool for machining solid materials like wood and metal. 29 Institute Profile : Central Institute of Tool Design

Cost-effective training ITEC Administration at CITD CITD charges INR 23,000 (approximately US$ 370) Potential candidates use the informal peer network in their countries to learn per participant for a six- about ITEC courses on offer. They also visit the Indian embassy in their country, week training course, where details of these programs are available, and then apply for their which the MEA pays the preferred courses through the embassy. After preliminary checks, the embassy Institute once candidates forwards their applications on to the MEA, which decides on candidate selection commence training. This jointly with CITD. As most of these processes are performed online, the time amount covers CITD's taken between application processing and selection of candidates is minimal. teaching costs as well as the costs for accommodation and food for the ITEC participants. As with other ITEC courses, the training offered by CITD is extremely cost- effective. By way of comparison, it is worth noting that INR 23,000 would not be sufficient to cover airfare costs for a Burmese or Sri Lankan student traveling to the USA or UK for a similar training course.

The MEA further gives ITEC students at CITD a monthly stipend of INR 25,000 per month to cover living expenses. Some candidates also receive additional stipends from their respective governments.

CITD also arranges guided tours around the city of Hyderabad, allowing participants to glimpse India’s history, cultural diversity, and dynamism. This very often strengthens positive impressions of India. Suggestions & conclusions

The diversity of courses on offer at CITD allows prospective students to choose programmes that are in line with their national development priorities, making the CITD highly sought after by ITEC candidates. However, as is the case with ITEC programmes at many institutes, there is no robust process to analyse the impact of the training students receive.

A formal alumni network where former ITEC students could keep in touch with each other, as well as the ITEC institute of which they were a part, and where they could update their professional activities could be one simple way to assess how effectively candidates have been able to put their training to use in their countries. Other feedback mechanisms such as online questionnaires that could be completed by graduating ITEC scholars would help CITD to better evaluate the strengths and weaknesses of its training programmes, allowing the institute and the MEA to shape ITEC courses to more effectively address participants’ needs.

Training Facilities and Equipment at the Central Institute of Tool Design

Surface Grinding Machine at the Central Institute of Tool Design, Hyderabad. Pneumatic Sensors at the Central Institute of Tool Design, Hyderabad

Image source: Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) initiative IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation 30 Entrepreneurship Development Institute Ahmedabad, Gujarat

Established in 1983, the Entrepreneurship Development Institute (EDI) in Ahmedabad helps entrepreneurs from India and abroad develop expertise in setting up small and medium-scale businesses across a variety of sectors.58 To help aspiring entrepreneurs grow their businesses, the programmes at EDI emphasize the use of low-cost technologies, which can drastically reduce the repair and maintenance costs of the production mechanisms new businesses employ, thereby helping new businesses become more competitive.59 EDI as an ITEC partner By the turn of the 21st century, the Indian Ministry of External Affairs established that sharing EDI’s unique experiences could allow entrepreneurs from the developing world an opportunity to upgrade their skills in entrepreneurship development through the ITEC programme. The MEA also recognised that sharing EDI’s experiences would prove mutually beneficial to India and the ITEC partner country. As entrepreneurs from across the developing world came to India under ITEC, the contacts they would form with aspiring Indian entrepreneurs at EDI and other institutes would give emerging Indian businesses a welcome opportunity to expand their own businesses abroad. EDI became a part of the ITEC programme in 2000-01. Over the last decade, the institute has grown as an ITEC partner. From initially offering two courses to 28 candidates in 2001-02, as of 2014-15, EDI offers 420 ITEC slots in 14 courses that range from developing agri-business, innovation mechanisms, capital markets, and investment banking. Between 2001-02 and 2014-15, EDI has trained nearly 2,700 candidates from 140 ITEC partner countries in over 100 short-term training courses that include investment banking, social entrepreneurship and small-scale business development among many others. ITEC trainees at EDI largely come from Afghanistan, Myanmar, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, and Sri Lanka. 60 Study tours To help candidates understand some of the challenges associated with setting up new businesses, ITEC students at EDI are taken to various industrial parks in Ahmedabad, as well as to Coimbatore in the southern Indian state of Tamilnadu. In addition to providing ITEC students opportunities to build contacts with Indian entrepreneurs through these visits, students get a more practical understanding of the challenges and opportunities commonly faced while setting up a new business. Entrepreneurship Development Institute, Ahmedabad

ITEC hostel at EDI Main teaching block at EDI Image source: Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) initiative

58See Entrepreneurship Development Institute Corporate Brochure, available at http://www.ediindia.org/doc/Corporate-Brochure.pdf (accessed 22nd January 2015). 59 IDCR interview with EDI, January 2015. 60Between 2000 and 2014, nearly 25 percent of ITEC students trained at EDI have been from these 5 countries. IDCR interview with EDI, January 2015. 31 Institute Profile : Entrepreneurship Development Institute

Robust alumni network EDI maintains a robust alumni network through which the institute is able to monitor the progress of ITEC alumni. The alumni network also allows EDI the opportunity to receive regular feedback from former students, enabling EDI to tailor ITEC courses to more effectively address the needs of ITEC participants.61 EDI’s experiences in developing and maintaining an informal alumni network highlights some of the advantages such a network can offer to ITEC students as well as to ITEC partner institutes. Suggestions & conclusions According to EDI faculty, many ITEC programme participants found the study tours to be the highlight of their course at EDI. However, in some cases, EDI had to use its own resources to facilitate these study tours. A minor increase in the financial allocations towards the study tours would help EDI organize these tours without using resources from its own budget. Further, EDI’s informal alumni network highlighted that many ITEC alumni were eager to enroll in more advanced courses for entrepreneurship development at EDI. However, ITEC rules do not presently allow a participant to enroll in such a refresher course. Changing these rules could allow former ITEC students to further upgrade their skills and strengthen people-to-people contacts, while also further improving commercial relations between India and ITEC partner countries.

The Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad, Gujarat

The Indian Institute of Management at Ahmedabad (IIM-A) is one of India’s premier management institutes, and is consistently ranked among the best business schools in the world.62 IIM-A became an ITEC partner in May 2014, offering the Post Graduate programme in Executive Management (PGPX) programme to ITEC candidates from 2015-16.63

Learning management skills

The one year management programme at IIM-A is geared towards mid-level executives,64 and focuses on developing skills in management control and metrics, quality management, leadership skills and financial reporting among others. Unlike most ITEC courses, the PGPX allows ITEC participants to study alongside Indian students and with other non-ITEC international students enrolled in the programme. It also presents ITEC participants with the opportunity to get a world-class MBA for free.

Cost effective programme

Given the excellent infrastructure and the high quality of courses available for study at IIM-A, the programme fee for the PGPX programme (which includes tuition, accommodation, food, books, etc) is about a quarter of the cost of similar programmes at internationally competitive business schools such as Wharton,65 or London Business School.66

61Ibid. 62 The Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad is ranked 22nd. For more, see “Global MBA Ranking 2013”, available at http://rankings.ft.com/businessschoolrankings/global- mba-ranking-2013 (accessed on 21st January 2015). 63The application process for entry into the year 2015-16 begins in 2014-15. 64Mid-level executives are those who have at least 5 to 7 years of work experience. 65For more, see “Important Q&A’s on the PGPX program”, available at http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/users/pgpx/files/PGPX-FAQS.pdf, (accessed on 21st January 2015). 66Ibid. IDCR Report: 50 Years of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation 32

Suggestions

All candidates who apply for the for the PGPX programme need to register a high score on the Graduate Management Aptitude Test (GMAT), an online test that is administered to test the candidate’s verbal and quantitative aptitude.67 Since IIM-A is a globally ranked programme with a high average GMAT score of their students and the high application standards at IIM-A are not waived for ITEC students, it makes it difficult for ITEC participants to meet these standards and get accepted into the PGPX programme.

To encourage students from ITEC partner countries to enrol in IIM-A, the university could consider offering short-term courses in business, accounting, leadership and corporate governance among others that have less stringent entry requirements. These courses are significantly cheaper as well and would allow the MEA to bring in more ITEC participants at a comparatively lower cost than that of the PGPX programme.

The Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad

New campus at IIM, Ahmedabad (Image source: Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) initiative)

Main library at IIM, Ahmedabad (Image source: website of IIM, Ahmedabad, available at www.iimahd.ernet.in)

67 This is one among the multiple entry requirements for application to the PGPX program. KEY RECOMMENDATIONS

The following are the recommendations that emerged during the course of IDCR’s study of the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation Programme.

Structure and Design of ITEC Courses

• Provide a degree/diploma for participants upon passing an exam, in addition to the generally issued certificate of attendance • Offer online courses, as well as more partnership between ITEC training centres and institutes abroad to train candidates who cannot avail of ITEC training in person due to lack of slots or funds • Encourage greater Indian private sector participation in the design and delivery of ITEC courses • Enable greater flexibility of course provision timing through mechanisms such as funding over a two-year period

Administration and Capacity Building

• Feature more ITEC-related developments in the Ministry of External Affairs’ publications and website, including new ITEC partner countries and projects • Provide a translation and interpretation system to increase and improve the participation of non-English speakers • Set India-wide, updated standards for funding given to Indian institutes to provide ITEC training course and expedite the process of crediting funds to ITEC training institutes • Upgrade training and accommodation facilities at all institutes providing ITEC training in accordance with international standards

Engagement with ITEC Alumni

• Create online questionnaires for ITEC students to evaluate ITEC programmes and courses upon completion, including online suggestions for improving particular courses and programmes and make questionnaire feedback publically available • Arrange refresher courses for ITEC alumni • Create an ITEC alumni network programme including an online alumni community by having a website using social media such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. • Engage with the ITEC community of a country through the Indian Mission/Embassy in that country and use that alumni community to create public directories of business chambers and other materials helpful to the Indian public and private sectors About IDCR

The project on Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) is based at the Centre for Policy Research (CPR). With funding from the Asia Foundation, IDCR is developing a comprehensive database of Indian development assistance and publicly disseminating narratives on Indian bilateral development partnerships through their website at www.idcr.cprindia.org.

IDCR Team

Rani D. Mullen is Associate Professor of Government at the College of William & Mary, USA, a Senior Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Policy Research, India and the Director of the Indian Development Cooperation Research. Her research focuses on democratization and development in South Asia, India and Afghanistan in particular. Her current research focuses on Indian foreign aid. She is the author of Decentralization, Local Governance, and Social Well being in India: Do Local Governments Matter? (Routledge, 2011). Dr. Mullen has worked for the World Bank, U.S.A.I.D., and for a German parliament member. She has a M.A. from SAIS, The Johns Hopkins University, and a M.A and Ph.D. from Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School.

Hemant Shivakumar is a Research Associate with the Indian Development Cooperation Research at the Centre for Policy Research, where he catalogues and analyses India's development cooperation, investments and its impact on India's external relations.

Kailash K. Prasad is a Research Associate with the Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) program at the Centre for Policy Research. His work at IDCR focuses on Indian foreign aid and on the impact Indian development cooperation has had on New Delhi's bi-lateral relations with its extended neighborhood.

Kunal Singh was a Research Associate with the Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR) program at the Centre for Policy Research. His work involves qualitative analysis of historical evolution of Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation (ITEC) programme and India's development cooperation.

Sanskriti Jain was a Research Associate at the Indian Development Cooperation Research initiative at the Centre for Policy Research. She set up the initial database and she focuses on the quantitative analysis of India's development assistance programs and its impact on India's foreign relations.

Sanjana Haribhakti was a Research Associate at the Indian Development Cooperation Research initiative at the Centre for Policy Research. Her work at IDCR involved a qualitative assessment of India's foreign aid program and its role in shaping India's strategic interactions within the international community.

Contact: Indian Development Cooperation Research (IDCR)

Centre for Policy Research,

Dharam Marg, Chanakyapuri, New Delhi - 110021 e: [email protected] p: +91 11 2611 5275 | Ext: 219 or 225