Mauritian Foreign Affairs, Regional Integration and International Trade Minister Arvin Boolell has said the government is doing its best to create the enabling environment to encourage cross-border investments, PANA reported from the capital, Port-Louis, Wednesday.
Speaking at a workshop on Trade in Services in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC), the Minister said “when we talk about trade in services we should think about crossing borders and looking at cross-border investments and also be inspired by the experience we have acquired over the years in Mauritius.”
He emphasised that Mauritius has comparative advantages over other countries.
“Money is coming from emerging markets, from developed countries to new frontiers, and Africa has become the new frontier, this is where the money is going and where investment is flowing, and this is why we need to gear our minds, thoughts and policies and cross-borders to invest in Africa,” the Minister told some 30 participants from the public and private sectors.
Boolell said as policy-makers ”we are putting our best endeavour to make things happen and the support of stakeholders is crucial in this process.”
PANA reports that SADC member-states are presently engaged in Trade in Services negotiations based on a request/offer basis.
They are involved in a process of making specific requests to each other to open their markets on respective wish lists and subsequently for each member to respond to these requests as to what extent it would be prepared to open its services market.
According to one official of the Ministry, the negotiations cover six priority sectors, namely communications, tourism, financial services, transport, construction and energy-related services.
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