The US sets great store by fostering state-to-state relationships, Ms Reta Jo Lewis, Special Representative for Global Intergovernmental Affairs, US State Department, told Business Line recently.

Ms Lewis was in Chennai during her weeklong “fact finding mission” in India during which she met with a number of State Government officials. She was earlier in Assam, Orissa and Andhra Pradesh.

The Special Representative, who reports to the Secretary of State, Ms Hillary Clinton, stressed that while foreign policy would be on a nation-to-nation level, the implementation of it would require a lot of state-to-state dialogue and partnership. After her tour of India, she would be able to “educate our leaders more intelligently” on where specifically the commonality of theme lies at the ground level.

For instance, she said she found a lot of interest in India in partnership in vocational and technical training and skill development. Did anyone ask for money? “No, no one has asked me for money,” Ms Lewis said, noting that the thirst was more in terms of co-operation in areas such as curriculum building, best practices, sharing of models for providing apprenticeship opportunities to the trainees and even support in terms of technical manpower.

Ms Lewis also discovered a lot of interest in co-operation in port and airport development and in tourism. Infrastructure builders were interested in learning best practices in managing issues. “Elected representatives here and in the US face the same set of problems and challenges,” she said.

She said that the US could also help by offering models for working government-private partnership in tourism.

The office of the Special Representative for Global Intergovernmental Affairs recently midwifed the creation of a US-China Governors Forum, which has been described as a “sub-national mechanism” for meetings and interactions with officials at the State or provincial level.

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