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The Co-Chair of the South Africa – Saudi Arabia Business Council, Dr Iqbal Surve says that the South African and Saudi Arabian business communities must engage more in order to increase their footprint in the others business economies.
 
Dr Surve was addressing the South Africa – Saudi Arabia Business Forum that took place at the Sandton Convention Centre, today.
 
“It is key that we encourage our private sectors to engage more with the Saudi’s in order to link our corporate sectors. South Africa and Saudi Arabia are not short of capital. Our countries both have good infrastructure and we both are hugely competitive as economies. It is important that we use our similarities to link our business sectors,” he said.
 
The Business Forum highlighted economic and business opportunities that existed in both countries for joint venture purposes. The main sectors targeted ranged from mining, real estate, telecommunications, the health sector, food security and infrastructure development.
 
South Africa’s Ambassador to Saudi Arabia, Mr Sadiq Jaffer says the Business Forum is key in fast-tracking South Africa and Saudi Arabia to achieve the terms of their workplan.
 
“The main idea is that we need to increase business interactions between Saudi Arabian and South African economies and this is part of the process where we introduce both countries into the others market. The challenge that we all face is increasing trade and investment flows,” he said.
 
He added that in Saudi Arabia Infrastructure development is one of the key sectors South African businesses can tap into.
 
“Mining is also key and Saudi Arabia has large untapped mining deposits which we can assist with our expertise and because of our complementary needs we can very well tie up and collaborate in terms of South Africa business and Saudi Business. Saudi Arabia in a broad sense they need food security and agriculture is the food sector and that is a direct link for us. On the South African side what we want to target is the issue of agriculture, mining, infrastructure and petro-chemicals. If you look into the petro-chemicals sector, it is one of Saudi Arabia key sectors, so we see a very good tie-up. They have identified the green renewable energy which fits in line with what we have identified so that is another good fit. There are already a few green projects the Saudi’s have invested in our country and we want to encourage more investment into the renewable sector,” emphasised Ambassador Jaffer
 
He highlighted that the South Africa–Saudi Arabia Business Council will within the identified sectors; identify particular projects they will collaborate on.
 
The two co-chairs of the South Africa–Saudi Arabia Business Council will on Thursday provide a feedback to the SA/Saudi Joint Economic Commission on today’s Business Forum.