Alexandre Rocha
São Paulo – The São Paulo state government and the Algerian embassy in Brasília have started talks to prepare a joint agenda. The ambassador of the Arab country, Lahcène Moussaoui, was recently in the state of São Paulo talking to state governor Geraldo Alckmin and to state Science, Technology, Economic Development, and Tourism secretary João Carlos Meirelles.
"The idea is to develop joint agendas in three areas up to the end of the year: health, food, and civil construction," informed Arab Brazilian Chamber of Commerce (CCAB) president Paulo Sérgio Atallah, who participated in both meetings.
There is potential for medicine supply to Algeria. According to information provided by the Algerian Health Ministry, published by news agency Algérie Presse Service, the local medicine production is only enough to cover 25% of the domestic demand.
Meirelles, in turn, mentioned the possibility of business in the medical equipment and dentistry area, and the exchange of experience in the hospital management area, based on projects developed by the state.
In the food sector, apart from business opportunities involving products, Meirelles mentioned the possibility of information exchange with research organizations such as the Food Technology Institute (Ital), based in Campinas, in the countryside of the state, an organization connected to the Agriculture Secretariat.
In the civil construction area, Meirelles and the ambassador discussed the possibility of goods and service export from Brazil to Algeria and the organization of a business mission to the Arab country. Recently the Algerian government announced the intention of building one million houses for the country population.
In an interview to ANBA, Moussaoui added that his country has already used Brazilian civil construction services, with the three main Algerian universities and Algiers airport being designed by famous Brazilian architect Oscar Niemeyer (who designed Brazilian capital Brasília, among other projects) and were built by Brazilian construction company Rabelo.
So as to proceed with negotiations, Meirelles and Moussaoui would like the Algerian ministers connected to the three areas under negotiation to accompany country president Abdelaziz Bouteflika during the visit he is going to take to Brazil up to the end of the year. Atallah stated he would get in contact with the Brazilian Foreign Office (Itamaraty) regarding the possibility of adding the three to the official travel agenda.
Before that, however, the CCAB president should discuss a possible deepening of cooperation between both countries with Algerian authorities and businessmen during his visit to the Arab country for Algiers International Fair, between June 02 and 10. In all, ten Brazilian companies in various sectors are going to exhibit at the event.
PPP
Apart from these three sectors, the ambassador was also greatly interested in the public-private partnership (PPP) law, recently approved by the state Legislative Assembly, and in the possibility of Algerian state-owned oil company Sonatrach, doing business in the natural gas area in the state.
As the North African country has the fifth largest natural gas reserves in the world, Sonatrach has state of the art technology in fuel exploration and distribution, even investing in other countries, among them Peru.
However, exploration of immense gas reserves discovered in Santos Basin depends on agreements with the federal government, and product distribution in São Paulo is already in the hands of three companies: Comgás, Gás Brasiliano, and Gás Natural.
