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Egypt – EFTA Free
Trade Agreement Over 400 businessmen participate in a conference to discuss the future of trade and investments between Egypt and EFTA States Under the auspices of the H.E. Eng. Rachid Mohamed Rachid, Minister of Trade & Industry, the Free Trade Agreement between the Arab Republic of Egypt and the EFTA States (Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland) will be presented in the Conrad Hotel in Cairo today. The Launching Event is organised by the Egyptian Commercial Service (ECS) in collaboration with the Embassies of Switzerland and Norway. The conference is supported by the Swiss Egyptian Business Association (SEBA) and the Egyptian Scandinavian Business Association (ESBA). H.E. Dr. Mahmoud Mohieldin, Minister of Investments, will address the conference with a key note speech about the future of economic relations between Egypt and EFTA. The purpose of the conference is to launch the Free Trade Agreement which entered into force on the 1st of August, 2007. H.E. Mr. Frode Berge, Minister of State for Trade & Industry of Norway, Dr. Didier Chambovey, Deputy Secretary General of the EFTA and H.E. Ambassador Christian Etter, Delegate for Trade Agreements of the Swiss Government will participate at the event. According to H.E. Minister Mohieldin the main objective of the agreement is to support and increase the bilateral trade between Egypt & EFTA States. The agreement will also promote the economic integration into the Euromed Zone through the liberalisation of trade in industrial products and processed agricultural products. It also contains provisions in view of increasing the foreign direct investments and concerning the intellectual property rights. In his keynote speech, H.E. Minister Mohieldin expresses on behalf of Minister Rachid the hope that this agreement will contribute to increasing the balance of trade between Egypt and EFTA States in view to reach the target of 500 Mio. Dollars. The agreement contains an immediate liberalization for Egyptian exports of industrial products and the gradual reduction of Egyptian customs tariffs on industrial imports from the EFTA States. According to Minister Mohieldin the Free Trade Agreement with the EFTA falls into the overall exports strategy of the Egyptian government to supporting the integration in the international markets. As for the EFTA States, this agreement leads to the effective participation and economic integration in the Euromed Zone, by granting companies from EFTA States the same competitive advantages on the Egyptian Market as for their competitors from the European Union. From his part Mr. Mamdouh Mostafa, Head of the Egyptian Commercial Service (ECS), indicates that this conference comes within the framework of the exports promotion cooperation between the Ministry of Trade and Industry in collaboration and all specialized entities inside or outside Egypt. According to Egyptian data, the exports and imports between Egypt and EFTA have increased by 174.4 million Dollars in 2006. This means an increase of 83.4% compared to the trade in 2005. There was also a notable increase in the Egyptian exports to the EFTA States during the same years. A trade surplus in favour of Egypt reached 175.2 million Dollars. Last year the overall bilateral trade reached 384.4 million Dollars. The Free Trade Agreement was signed by H.E. Minister Rachid on January 27th, 2007 in the margin the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland. Cairo, 10. 9. 2007 |