Bangladesh has been nominated as the Vice Chairman of Indian Ocean Rim Association (IORA) for the period of 2019-21 and eventually as the Chairman for the period of 2021-23.
Md Khurshed Alam, Secretary (Maritime Affairs Unit) of the Foreign Ministry, flagged the proposal at the Committee of Senior Officials meeting held on July 30-31in South Africa, the current chair of IORA.
All the member states of IORA unanimously supported Bangladesh’s proposal, says a press release.
The meeting was attended by delegations from its 21 members, which included current vice chair the UAE, Australia, India, Indonesia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Mauritius, Thailand and Singapore among others.
The meeting was also attended by seven dialogue partners of the association.
During the two-day long meeting, Bangladesh informed that the pilot project funded by IORA on “Exploration of economically important marine flora from the Bay of Bengal” has just been completed and the other IORA funded pilot project on “Introduction of Oyster Culture in Bangladesh” is being implemented by the Department of Fisheries.
Bangladesh also informed that Bangladesh would host the third IORA Blue Economy Ministerial Conference in Dhaka on the first week of September 2019.
This will be the first ever IORA ministerial to be organised by Bangladesh.