?GUWAHATI, Feb 17 ? Cooperation between India and Israel is increasing in different fields with every passing year and Israel is willing to extend its expertise in fields like agriculture, irrigation, water management etc to the North East region of the country. This was disclosed by Shimon Mercer Wood, who is the head of political affairs of the Embassy of Israel in New Delhi.
Wood, who recently visited Assam and Meghalaya to assess the situation and to explore the possibility of mutual cooperation, told The Assam Tribune that there is a ?huge sense of goodwill among the people of the North East towards Israel and there is every possibility of translating the goodwill into mutual cooperation.? He said that during his visit to the region, he spoke to cross sections of people including political leaders, church leaders and others.
The diplomat said that Israel would be too happy to provide its expertise on agriculture to the farmers of the North East. Israel embassy has one agronomist and any State Government can take help from him. Israel is also opening 31 centres of excellence in different parts of India in collaboration with the Government of India and the farmers of the North East can be linked up with the centres for their benefits. It may be mentioned here that despite shortage of water and other natural problems, Israel is exporting agriculture products and Wood said that use of scientific methods helped in increasing production. He pointed out that Israel imports some grains from other countries but is giving stress on production of high value crops to earn foreign exchange.
Wood revealed that the people of Israel, who like strong tea, would like Assam tea, while, textile is another area where Assam can look forward to export products to his country. Israel can also provide assistance in water management to prevent waste of water to the farmers and others in the North East and this issue was discussed by him when he met political leaders in Meghalaya.
On tourism sector, Wood said that the tourists from Israel would be happy to come to the region for adventure tourism. He said that around 40,000 tourists from Israel visit India every year, but not many of them visit this region. He assured that the Israel embassy in Delhi would try to encourage tourists from that country to visit the region.
Commenting on India-Israel relations, Wood said that the cooperation between the countries in matters of agriculture and defence is increasing. Though he refused to go into the details of the defence deals between India and Israel, he said, ?the cooperation in this field is beyond the buyer-seller relations.? He also said that the civilian trade between India and Israel is around five billion Dollars at present and it will increase substantially once the free trade agreement is signed between both the countries.
Replying to a question on the threat faced from extremists, Wood said that both India and Israel are facing a common threat from the extremists who are out to target anyone who does not follow their beliefs. He pointed out that during the Mumbai terror attacks, the Israeli nationals were also targeted.
Source: http://www.assamtribune.com/scripts/detailsnew.asp?id=feb1813/at05
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