(a) whether Asian Development Bank has provided financial/technical assistance to India for the tourism sector during the last three years;
(b) if so, the details thereof; and
(c) the States where said financial/technical assistance has been utilized?
MINISTER OF STATE FOR TOURISM (INDEPENDENT CHARGE) (SMT RENUKA CHOWDHURY)
(a),(b)&(c): The Asian Development Bank(ADB) is supporting sub-regional cooperation in
Eastern South Asia based on the establishments of the South Asian Growth Quadrangle,
comprising Bangladesh, Bhutan, India and Nepal(BBIN). Regional Technical Assistance has
helped the participating countries establish institutional framework (a country advisers’
group and sector working groups) through the South Asia Sub-regional Cooperation
(SASEC) programme.
The Technical Assistance’s purpose is to prepare, with active participation of BBIN’s
tourism sectors, a SASEC Tourism Development Plan (TDP) that will provide a thematic
framework of programmes and future sub-regional cooperation activities of the Tourism
Working Group (TWG).
The Technical Assistance will help achieve, through sub-regional cooperation,
significant growth in tourism, leading to overall economic growth and reduction of rural
poverty in SASEC. The Technical Assistance (TA) is estimated to cost $450,000 and will be
financed on a grant basis by Asian Development Bank’s technical assistance funding
programme.
Asian Development Bank will be the Executive Agency for the technical assistance.
The work will be undertaken on behalf of the TWG and carried out in close cooperation with
BBIN tourism ministries and NTOs to promote ownership and facilitate implementation and
fieldwork. The final report from Asian Development Bank on South Asia Sub-regional
Economic Cooperation (SASEC) Tourism Development Plan is awaited.