India-Nigeria Direct Flight to Start Very Soon – Envoy

Indian High Commissioner to Nigeria, Gangadharan Balasubramanian

India-Nigeria Direct Flight to Start Very Soon – Envoy

The Indian High Commissioner to Nigeria, Gangadharan Balasubramanian, has announced that a direct flight between India and Nigeria will begin in less than a month.

He made the announcement on Thursday in Abuja while speaking with journalists.

The flight, according to Balasubramanian, will boost economic and trade ties, as well as strengthen people-to-people connections between the two countries.

He added that the development is expected to increase the volume of trade between India and Nigeria, particularly reducing the deficit of trade flowing from India to Nigeria.

“I am happy to say that yesterday I got information from Air Peace that they are going to start very soon.

“They have all the permission to fly to Bombay, I am just awaiting the date from them,“ the envoy said optimistically.

Balasubramanian noted that the trade cooperation between both countries have been stable and strong over the years, as they continue to explore areas of improvements.

“Cooperation with Nigeria has been very strong and has been goin on. In spite of COVID, it has been going on.

“Physical meetings were a little bit disturb during the COVID-19 era but we continued to have virtual meetings

“In 2022, it has been 14.95 billion dollars in favor of Nigeria. we get about 10 and half billion dollars-worth of oil from you and about four and half dollars of goods and including things which we send to Nigeria.

“There is a lot of cooperation in trade and we hope to increase it better. Balancing the trade depends on the demand and supply on both sides so it is a commercial thing.

“But we are trying to look at the foundation agreements like the double taxation avoidance treaty, bilateral investment treaties put in place which are important for increasing trade and economic cooperation,” Balasubramanian said.

Balasubramanian listed information, communication and technology as critical areas that both countries are already increasing cooperation.

He said that on ICT, India has developed an indigenous 5G technology which it has offered to Nigeria.

“We are certainly trying to look at ICT areas, particularly 5G, UPI, Universal Payment Index, and also the tech part of it.

“It will be possible for us to achieve all these things and help us in our trade and economic cooperation.

“In Agriculture, we are trying to revive better. So these are some of the areas we will be concentrating in the fort-coming period.

“Airtel is one of the biggest mobile company technology providers in India has also won the next 5G spectrum over here.

“So they are programmes which are going on apart from the capacity building which we have been helping out on in terms of ICT also,” the High Commissioner added.

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