ECOWAS Supports UNIDO’s Tool For Regional Investment Promotion
- Details
- Category: Latest
- Tuesday, 26 June 2012
- By Elombah.com
The ECOWAS Commission has expressed its willingness to key into the Investment Monitoring Platform (IMP), a new web portal developed by the UN Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO) within the framework of the African Regional Investment Promotion Programme. Speaking on behalf of the President of the Commission during
a meeting
in Abuja on Monday 25th June 2012 with UNIDO and African Union (AU) officials, the ECOWAS Director of Private Sector, Mr. Alfred Braimah, said the IMP tool, a major component of AFRIPANET Programme, “fits into the regional investment promotion architecture,” being developed by the Commission.
“A key objective of Regional Economic Communities (RECs) is to attract
investors, and we at ECOWAS want to make our sub-region an attractive
investment destination and make our enterprises competitive to enable
us deliver on our regional development agenda,” the Director affirmed.
In a detailed presentation, Mr. Mithat Kulur, Chief, Investment and
Technology Unit of UNIDO, explained that the AFRIPANET Programme
produced with the support of a 42-member Pan-African Network of
Investment Promotion Agencies under UNIDO’s coordination, has four key
components – Data collection, IMP platform, Capacity building and
Business linkages.
The goal of the Programme, he said, is to change the culture of
investment promotion in Africa, with emphasis on development as
against service provision, and for greater economic impact.
The Programme has been launched in 10 of the 19 countries where data
were collected while six Sub-Contracting Partnership Exchange (SPX)
Centres have also been established, with Mr. Kulur describing as “very
positive” the response by the public and private sectors to the tool.
He also noted that the “demand is high” for the investment promotion
programme, adding that operationalization and expansion were the next
steps.
According to the UNIDO official, the European Union and other partners
that contributed about Euro 8 million for the development of the
Programme, are also “happy with the pilot scheme,” adding that the aim
is to make the RECs and the AU key users of the web-based IMP tool.
In his remarks, the UNIDO Ambassador to ECOWAS, Dr. Patrick Kormawa,
who is also the UN Organization’s Representative and Director,
Regional Office, said the next step is how the Commission could key
into the IMP platform and move the process forward to increase
investment flow and stock of overall investments in Africa, thereby
creating more jobs and wealth.
Speaking in the same vein, the AU Director, Department of Trade and
Industry, Ms. Treasure Maphanga expressed the AU’s satisfaction with
the work by ECOWAS in trade and investment promotion in the region.
To underscore the importance attached by the ECOWAS Commission to this
subject, the meeting was attended by senior officials of the
Commission’s various Directorates as well as representatives of the
Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission and the Association of
Investment Promotion Agencies of West Africa.
