David Johnston (WA, Liberal Party, Minister for Defence) Share this | Hansard source

This agreement will facilitate deeper bilateral defence science, technology and equipment cooperation, allowing Australia and Japan to work more closely to identify potential areas of future research interest and mutual benefit. Japan is world renowned for its defence science and technology experience and capability. By increasing our cooperation, it is expected both nations will be able to reduce the costs of developing defence capability. Our first cooperative defence project with Japan is a marine hydrodynamics project, which will be conducted by our Defence Science and Technology Organisation, DSTO, and Japan's Technical Research and Development Institute, TRDI. As the foreign minister said recently, no nation has been more important to Australia finding its place in Asia than has Japan. For decades, Japan was our largest trading partner and today Japan remains our second largest trading partner, with $71 billion traded between us in 2012. The signing of this agreement is yet another natural progression in our very strong relationship. (Time expired)