Andaman and Nicobar going to be maritime and startup hub

Recently, Prime Minister Narendra Modi reported that the Andaman and Nicobar islands region, owing to its strategic importance, was going to be developed as a “maritime and startup hub” and highlighted his government’s development initiatives for it.

Daily Current Affairs Quiz 2020

Key-Points

A transhipment hub has been proposed in the Andaman and Nicobar islands. A transshipment is when cargo or a container is moved from one vessel to another while in transit to its final destination.

It will be built in South Bay, Great Nicobar Island, to provide Indian shippers an alternative to the Colombo (Sri Lanka), Singapore and Port Klang (Malaysia) transshipment ports.

12 islands of the archipelago have been selected for high-impact projects with an emphasis on boosting trade of sea-based, organic and coconut-based products of the region.

A submarine cable project has been launched in the islands to make it digitally independent. The fibre will connect chennai and port blair and seven other islands- Swaraj Deep (Havelock), Long island etc.

In 2015, the government had announced an ambitious, Rs 10,000 crore economic plan to transform the Andaman and Nicobar Islands into the country’s first maritime hub.