The Union Cabinet, chaired by the Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi has approved the signing of Memorandum of Cooperation (MoC) on Sustainable Urban Development between the Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs, Government of India and the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism, Government of Japan, in supersession of existing MoU of 2007 on Urban Development.

Implementation strategy

• A Joint Working Group (JWG) will be constituted to strategize and implement programmes on cooperation under the framework of the MoC.
  
• The Joint Working Group will meet once in a year, alternately in Japan and in India.
  
• The cooperation under this MoC will commence on the date of its signature and continue for a period of 5 years.
  
• Thereafter, it may be renewed automatically for further successive periods of 5 years at a time.

Major Impact

The MoC will promote strong, deep and long-term bilateral cooperation in the field of Sustainable Urban Development between the two countries.

Benefits

The MoC is expected to create employment opportunities in the areas of sustainable urban development, including Urban Planning, Smart Cities Development, Affordable Housing, (including rental housing), Urban Flood Management, Sewerage and Waste Water Management, Urban Transport (including Intelligent Transport Management System, Transit-Oriented Development and Multimodal Integration) and Disaster Resilient development.

Details

The objectives of the MoC are to facilitate and strengthen India-Japan technical cooperation in the field of Sustainable urban development including Urban Planning, Smart Cities Development, Affordable Housing (including rental housing), Urban Flood Management, Sewerage and Waste Water Management, Intelligent Transport Management System, Transit-Oriented Development, Multimodal Integration, Disaster Resilient development and other areas as mutually identified by both Sides. The proposed MoC will enable exchange of key learnings and best practices in the above-mentioned areas.

Source: PIB