The meeting is scheduled from October 29 to November 2 and about 100 delegates including foreign ministers, ambassadors and media representatives from member countries are expected to take part in the meeting.
The Secretary to Minister of External Affairs (MEA) Sudhir Vyas and Haryana Chief Secretary P K Chaudhary, while reviewing the arrangements said the motive behind this meeting is to showcase India and Gurgaon.
The 19 member states of the IOR-ARC association are Australia, Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Iran, Kenya, Madagascar, Malaysia, Mauritius, Mozambique, Oman, Seychelles, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Thailand, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.
Besides, the Association also has 5 dialogue partners including China, Egypt, France, Japan, United Kingdom.
The Indian Ocean Tourism Organisation and the Indian Ocean Research Group are observers.
The IOR-ARC Charter lists areas of cooperation including trade facilitation and liberalisation, promotion of foreign investment, scientific and technological exchanges, tourism; and the development of infrastructure and human resources inter-alia poverty alleviation, promotion of maritime transport and related matters, cooperation in the fields of fisheries trade etc, official said.
