São Paulo – The Foreign Trade vice president at the Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce, Rubens Hannun, and the director general of the Foreign Investment Promotion Agency (Fipa), Noureddine Zekri, of Tunisia, signed a memorandum of understanding to promote joint cooperation between both organisations and foster business between Brazil and Tunisia.
The agreement forecasts collaboration for attraction of investment to both countries through promotion of events, conferences, seminars and trade delegations, conferences, seminars and trade missions, as well as support to companies for implementation of common projects, like the exchange of commercial information, visiting programmes, etc.
“This is an agreement for cooperation, for annual plans for relations between the countries and their companies, in firm partnerships,” said Hannun. “It shows intentions of constant ties with us. As they (the Tunisians) are living a restructuring process, they are renewing their contact with the countries in which they are interested,” said the executive, pointing out the strong support to the embassy of Tunisia in Brasília, for the signing of the memorandum.
The document was signed some two weeks ago, amidst the promotion of the Tunisian Investment Forum, promoted by Fipa, which counted on the participation of the prime minister of Tunisia, Ali Larayedh, and the undersecretary for Political Affairs of the United States, Wendy Sherman. “She offered her full support to Tunisia,” said Hannun.
According to the memorandum, the Arab Brazilian Chamber should facilitate contact between Fipa and Brazilian companies, while the Tunisian agency should help companies from Brazil to implement their projects in Tunisia.
Tunisia was the tenth main importer of Brazilian products among the Arabs in the period from January to May this year, with US$ 143 million and a share of 2.58% in all the country shipped to the Arab world. The main items exported were foods. Tunisia was also the tenth supplier of products for Brazil, among them the Arabs, with sales of US$ 55.5 million. The trade basket was composed mainly of fertilizers.
*Translated by Mark Ament
