16/1/2018-6

Promotion of business opportunities in the heart of the Middle East Hong Kong’s first UAE business summit

The One Belt and One Road initiative strengthens the connection between the Middle East and Hong Kong and the Mainland. More and more businesses and investors are paying attention to the project in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). The Hong Kong Middle East Association of Business People for the first time this month held the “Belt and Road”: Middle East UAE Opportunity Summit “to promote business opportunities in the UAE. The UAE delegation anticipates that this summit will open a whole new window of opportunity for businesses and investors.

Since the implementation of the Belt and Road initiative for more than four years, it has achieved fruitful early results. It has also been highly recognized and supported by the world. Mei Chi-kieh, chairman of Hong Kong Association of Middle East Business People, said that the Belt and Road initiative has drawn more Chinese companies to the Middle East market. If the metaphor for Hong Kong is that China is the hub of the world, then the UAE is the core of the Middle East. He also mentioned at the forum that domestic funds are particularly interested in projects in the Middle East such as real estate and infrastructure. In the past year, inquiries on projects in the UAE and the Middle East have more than tripled.

The trade volume between UAE and Hong Kong increased strongly

The summit is the first major commercial summit in the Mainland and Hong Kong on the Middle East region on the Belt and Road initiative. It was fully supported by the Consulate General of the UAE in Hong Kong and was dispatched by a high-level delegation from the UAE government and the private sector to attend the summit. Business opportunities. Addressing the speech, Nabila Shamshi, Consul General of the UAE in Hong Kong, mentioned that the UAE is Hong Kong’s largest trading partner and exporter in the Middle East.

Nabira Shamshi said the UAE is closely linked with Hong Kong. The bilateral trade volume between the two places has increased from an average of 14% in 2010 to 4.8 billion U.S. dollars in 2016 and has reached 10.6 billion U.S. dollars in 2016. In addition to the Belt and Road initiative, Dubai will host the World Expo in 2020. It is expected that the demand for local real estate, infrastructure, logistics and trade will rise more rapidly. She believes the summit opens up a whole new window of opportunity for businesses and investors.

The two sides will sign investment promotion and security agreement

Nabira Shamshi also mentioned that “the Belt and Road” will be the key to global economic growth in the 21st century. The UAE will fully cooperate with each other. Hong Kong, as a major trading partner, will also be the Middle East connecting the Far East of Asia A gate. She added that I believe we all know that the Hong Kong government also considers Dubai as one of the strategic locations and will set up an economic and trade office there. In addition, the two sides will sign an agreement on investment promotion and safeguards in the meantime. It can be expected that this will inevitably be to promote mutual investment An important step.

However, many people are unfamiliar with the Middle East and are worried about instability in the local political situation. UAE delegation Abu Dhabi Abu Dhabi, UAE chief executive of the Asia Pacific Markets and Chief Executive of Hong Kong Peng Zhi Le said at the summit, Moody’s rating agencies to give the UAE rating of Aa2, the outlook is stable, the best in the world area. He also mentioned that the local economic growth forecast for 2018 will be 3% higher than the global average.