Bimstec will be a failure without focus and political will

India is hosting the 10th ministerial meeting, which will be held tomorrow and on Friday.

Bimstec was established in 1997 through Thailand's initiative to connect countries in South and Southeast Asia, notably to link India's look east policy with Thailand's look west policy. The scheme had a clear goal to start with but has had no clear direction since then. Even the name of the grouping has been changed from time to time over the past decade, reflecting the confused mindset of its leaders.

It was named Bistec when it was set up in June 1997 after the initials of the founding members  Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka and Thailand Economic Cooperation. The name was changed six months later to Bimstec as Myanmar (Burma) joined as a new member.

The name was changed again when Thailand hosted the first Bimstec summit in Bangkok in 2004. Currently, the name stands for the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation. The current member countries are Bangladesh, Bhutan, Burma, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

Thailand had a very clear objective when it conceived Bimstec  to bring India in as a power to balance China, the other regional power house.

Bangkok has actively engaged China through the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) cooperation, which includes China's Yunnan province, Laos, Burma, Thailand, Cambodia and Vietnam. It wanted India to play an active role in making Bimstec a success as China did with GMS.

Unfortunately, Bimstec has developed at a slow pace when compared to GMS due to different political wills and direction.

The GMS had a very clear objective  to develop economic infrastructure in the Mekong basin. Countries in the region put priority on physical infrastructure, notably land transportation routes. Many road links have been upgraded since GMS was established in 1992, including the East=West Corridor to link Thailand, Laos and Vietnam as well as the NorthSouth Corridor to link Southwest China with Laos and Thailand. Many dams have been built in China and Laos for energy cooperation.

Whereas, in 11 years of Bimstec, no land route was even mapped for transportation development. Bimstec targets 13 sectors for cooperation but none of them get priority in development. While GSM concentrated on economic cooperation, Bimstec lost focus by mixing up too many areas, ranging from infrastructure to culture and antiterrorist cooperation.

Unlike countries in the Mekong basin, the political atmosphere in the Bay of Bengal is not really a supportive factor for regional cooperation. Some of the Bimstec members are not in favour of sharing mutual benefits.

The power houses of the two regions have also made a difference. While China has pushed strongly and poured a lot of resource such as capital for road construction in Laos to develop linkage with its Southeast Asian neighbours, India has not done much to propel Bimstec. 

Besides China, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has played a crucial role in promoting GMS cooperation. Japan and its financial institutions such as Japan Bank for International Cooperation (JBIC) also actively support GMS.

After a decade, the ADB has just reached out to Bimstec although the bank set foot in the region long ago. The bank would present its study on transportation links at the ministerial meeting in New Delhi this week. The bank would help conduct a concept paper for cooperation in many sectors including trade, investment, energy and tourism later.

The Mekong experience has driven home the lesson that cooperation at sub-regional level would be successful only through clear direction, capital and political will. If Bimstec is unable to put all these things together, it would be far away from success.