Indian Ocean Rim Association

It was established in 1997 and is a regional forum that seeks to build and expand understanding and mutually beneficial cooperation through a consensus-based, evolutionary and non-intrusive approach.
IORA has 22 member states, including Australia, Bangladesh, Comoros, India, Indonesia, Iran, Kenya, Madagascar, Malaysia, Maldives, Mauritius, Mozambique, Oman, Seychelles, Singapore, Somalia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Tanzania, Thailand, UAE, and Yemen.
Its Secretariat is based in Cyber City, Ebène, Mauritius.
It manages, coordinates, services and monitors the implementation of policy decisions, work programmes and projects adopted by the member states.
The association gains importance by the fact that the Indian Ocean carries half of the world’s container ships, one-third of the world’s bulk cargo traffic and
two-thirds of the world’s oil shipments.
It is a lifeline of international trade and transport and the Indian ocean region is woven together by trade routes and commands control of major sea-lanes.

India’s Role :

India continues to promote its official policy of “coordination, cooperation and partnership” in the regional maritime domain.
As coordinator to the priority area on disaster risk management, India has published guidelines for IORA. It has also urged partners to join the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure launched at the UN in September 2019.
India has been trying to emerge as the net provider of information in the IOR and in that direction it created the Information Fusion Centre located in Gurugram to assist member countries of IOR with real-time crisis information. Bangladesh, Mauritius, Maldives, Sri Lanka and Seychelles have been part of the information support structure of India.
Indian policy takes into consideration that IOR is not an India-run maritime domain and that is reflected in the government’s Security and Growth for All in the Region (SAGAR) programme, which aims to turn the region more inclusive.