31/01/2011
Ukraine Woos Saudi Investors
$ 600 million value of trade exchanges during the first 9 months of 2010
Ukraine is offering huge trade and investment opportunities particularly in its agricultural and infrastructure development sectors. This was disclosed by Mr. Alexander Nakonechnyi, Commercial Attache of the Ukrainian Embassy in Riyadh in a seminar at Asahrqia Chamber today.
He invited Saudi investors to explore opportunities in Ukraine in the production of agricultural products in line with the Kingdom's food security program under which Saudi Arabia has started investments to produce a number of food products in foreign countries in order to bring these products into the country.
Saudi Arabia has identified at least 27 countries for agricultural investments and a technical team has already visited 14 countries to explore investment prospects.
As part of its food security program, Saudi Deputy Minister of Agriculture Mr. Abdullah Al Obaid last June visited Ukraine and discussed possible cooperation of producing food grains there, said Mr. Nakonechnyi adding that Ukraine has the potential of becoming the "breadbasket" with its excellent soils category and good climate. Ukraine is the largest country in Europe with a land area of 603,550 square kilometers, of which 56 percent is arable. It has a population of over 46 million. Apart from food production, he urged Saudi companies to consider investments in processing of fruits, animal feed, poultry farming and green fertilizers.
While talking about infrastructure development, Mr. Nakonechnyi focused on the construction of roads, highways, bridges, airports, plants and factories in Ukraine in cooperation between the companies of the two countries. He also highlighted investment opportunities in the development of tourism and real estate projects.
He said that trade relations between the two countries are now set to increase with the opening of Saudi embassy in Kiev last year. Ukraine opened its embassy in Riyadh in 1996. There were a number of high levels visits of government officials between the two countries in recent years, noted Mr. Nakonechnyi.
The bilateral trade have not made much headway. The two-way trade exchanges were valued at around $600 million during first 9 months of 2010.
Saudi imports from Ukraine were mostly barley which represented over 80 percent of its total imports of $580 million from Ukraine during the period. Saudi Arabia mainly exports petrochemicals to Ukraine.
