The Forum “Prospects for Ukrainian-Arab Cooperation” was held in Kyiv on the 20th December 2018. The participants of the Forum from “Borysfen Intel” and the Ukrainian-Arab Business Council signed a memorandum of cooperation.
Addressing the Forum, President of the “Borysfen Intel” Centre Victor Hvozd emphasized the importance of building business contacts as a factor in economic cooperation, which strengthens the system of national security of Ukraine and Arab countries.
Among other things, V. Hvozd emphasized in his speech: “Investments are a matter of national security, and if everybody understood this, then perhaps we would not have the annexation of the Crimea and the war in the East of Ukraine. Billions of investments from different respected investors brought to Ukraine would automatically serve as a shield that would protect it reliably from the encroachments of our irrepressible neighbors. Please, note, that the countries into which the serious transnational companies invest, live in a completely different, better world… We should not create any illusions and hopes for a quick solution to our problems that have arisen in the Crimea and in the East of Ukraine. But we do need to resolve them, and this can only be done in the way of restoring our economy, which requires investment. Therefore, the volume of work performed by the Ukrainian-Arab Business Council is extremely important both for our state and society”.
In this context, V. Hvozd informed the participants of the Forum about the services provided by the Center headed by him, in particular in assessing and overcoming economic, political and military risks both in Ukraine and in the countries of the Middle East.
In his turn, President of the Ukrainian-Arab Business Council, Sheikh Emad Abu-Alrub, stressed that cooperation between Arab countries and Ukraine is opening great prospects.
“You now have a golden chance to cooperate with the Arab world. We have serious investors with significant funds, but from the Ukrainian side we expect that it will make the necessary changes to its legislation in order to create attractive conditions for investors”, Sheikh Emad Abu-Alrub was persuading the present.
In particular, bilateral business activity is somewhat limited by the tough visa regime with Ukraine, certain problems with the protection of investments and, of course, corruption. According to him, for the Arab investors, the most interesting in Ukraine are three spheres: agriculture, especially organic farming, technologies in the aircraft engineering and solar energy, as well as the purchase of commercial real estate for the purpose of long-term lease.
Photos by V. Rayevskyi
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Note: The Ukrainian-Arab Business Council was established in 2017 to promote the development of international business, political, economic, scientific and cultural relations between Ukraine and Arab countries in providing practical assistance to state authorities, local self-government and businesses in attracting foreign investments. |
