NUR-SULTAN (TCA) — At the invitation of the Egyptian side, on February 5-7, a Kazakh-Egyptian trade and investment business forum was held in Egypt. The event was attended by about 300 participants, Kazakh Invest national investment promotion company reported.
The Kazakh delegation, led by the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan Almas Aidarov, was represented by more than 60 Kazakh companies from 13 regions of Kazakhstan, as well as representatives of state agencies. From the Egyptian side, the forum was attended by over 200 representatives of the business community, as well as the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Egypt Tariq al-Washimi, Governor of South Sinai Province General Khaled Fuda, Head of the Federation of Egyptian Chambers of Commerce Ibrahim Al-Arabi.
According to Kairat Lama Sharif, the Ambassador of Kazakhstan to Egypt, both sides intend to build up cooperation in all areas of interaction to further increase the level of trade, economic and investment ties between the two countries.
“Kazakhstan considers Egypt as the gateway to Africa and is ready to promote exports, including with the assistance of the Kazakh-Egyptian Business Council and the Intergovernmental Commission on Trade and Economic Cooperation. An additional impetus to increase the export of Kazakhstani products will be given by the signing of the Free Trade Agreement between the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) member states and Egypt, which will open access to the Egyptian market with a population of over 100 million people," the Kazakh ambassador said.
According to the speakers, the rise in the price of products and the slowdown of trade between the two countries is due to the geographical remoteness of the states. However, as noted by the Vice Minister of Trade and Integration of Kazakhstan Kairat Torebayev, despite this, Kazakhstan sees the potential for increasing trade with Egypt by almost fourfold.
“In this context, domestic companies can offer quality goods worth about $300 million. In order to ensure food security, Egyptian companies can locate their export-oriented production facilities in Kazakhstan. For this direction, concessional lending for such projects, insurance of export contracts, reimbursement of costs for the transportation of goods and service support are provided. In addition, in the near future, Kazakhstan will subsidize the interest rate for foreign buyers of domestic products at the CIRR level. In other words, at the interest rate set by the OECD Secretariat on a monthly basis,” said Kairat Torebayev.
The intensification of work in this direction is associated with the upcoming first official visit of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Egypt to Kazakhstan and the holding of regular political and consular consultations between the two countries, as the Egyptian Deputy Foreign Minister Tariq al-Wasimi said in his speech.
As a result of the event, a number of economic documents were signed. In particular, Kazakh and Egyptian companies have agreed to supply one million bottles of water to the Egyptian market with the prospect of increasing the supply up to 3 million. Other agreements are on the production of pharmaceuticals on the basis of a Kazakh enterprise, and the acquisition of a copper deposit in Kazakhstan.
Source: TCA
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