India and Austria today signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) for technology cooperation in the shipping and port related infrastructure, said a government statement.
The MoU was signed by Indian shipping minister G K Vasan and Doris Bures, Austrian Federal Minister for Transport, Innovation & Technology in New Delhi.
Vasan said the MoU will pave way for sharing appropriate know-how, scientific knowledge and research and development capabilities between the two countries. “It will enable the Indian organizations in the ports and shipping sectors to acquire latest knowledge and technology etc. from Austria,” he said.
New technologies for implementation of International Ship & Port Security code, use of radio frequency identification in logistics and transport planning and optical character recognition in terminals to speed up the processing of containers in and out are the areas where Austrian expertise could be utilized in India, the statement said.
Realtime Kinematics (RTK) measurements of tides and currents for facilitations of berth to berth navigation in Gulf of Kutch and Gulf of Khambat could be developed with the Austrian expertise.
Since more than 300 kms of Danube river in Austria is used for navigation purpose with a well-developed and regulated inland waterway system their experience and expertise in the field of inland water transport would be beneficial to the development of inland water transport in India, it said.