Australian high commissioner Barry O’Farrell said on Thursday that according to Australia’s India economic strategy, Uttar Pradesh was a priority state and infrastructure development, education and agriculture were the focus areas for Australian investment in the state. O’Farrell met UP chief secretary RK Tiwari in Lucknow on Thursday, according to the chief secretary.

Tiwari apprised O’Farrell of various facilities and incentives available to investors in Uttar Pradesh and underlined that UP jumped many places to be ranked second in the country on the ease-of-doing-business rankings.

“The state has adequate necessary infrastructure, land, water, power and skilled manpower, which is conducive for investment. A lot of work is going on in the state in the medical and health sector as well. There are a lot of investment opportunities in UP in food processing, transport, agriculture, medical and health, education, cooperatives, logistics and warehousing,” said Tiwari as quoted in the statement.

He highlighted that the state had several expressways and more were coming up to improve connectivity for commerce and general commute. Tiwari also pointed out that UP has already established six nodes under the Defence Corridor for encouraging setting up of defence manufacturing industry and necessary facilities were being made available.

Uttar Pradesh aims for a gross state domestic product (GSDP) of $1 trillion in the next five years and has underlined the need to encourage organisational restructuring, focused policies and rules-based effective governance, faster decision making process and improved accountability to achieve the task.

Tiwari also shared the strategy adopted by the state for Covid-19 management, which had received praise from several quarters.

O’Farell also tweeted about his meeting with UP chief minister Yogi Adtiyanath and said they discussed how to deepen economic engagement, particularly on roads and infrastructure, water and skills development.