From 18 to 22 February Confindustria will host a series of meetings to present the opportunities for Chinese-Italian collaboration between small and medium-sized businesses based in third countries. The aim is to involve companies operating in the field of the supply of goods and services, of infrastructures and large-scale works.
Get to know Egypt, Kazakhstan and Georgia. A series of meetings hosted by Confindustria from 18 to 22 February will be addressed to the three countries and their participation in the Belt & Road Initiative project. A tour of seminars (to register you have until February 13) will reach Milan, Bologna, Turin, Rome and Verona.
The purpose is to introduce prospects for collaboration in ongoing and under development projects, Chinese or local governments to small and medium-sized businesses operating in the field of the supply of goods and services, of infrastructures and large-scale works (roads, railways, ports, airports, commercial building, social housing, large industrial plants, energy and waste water treatment). Representatives of the diplomatic network and the Foreign Trade Institute offices abroad will also take part to the meetings to share scenarios, opportunities and strategies.
Egypt is already the 34th destination market in the world for Italian exports and the sixth in the area of the Middle East and North Africa. Italian companies hold a market share of around 6.3%, surpassed only by Germany, among the European partners. By 2021 Sace, a credit insurance company which provides import support to the CDP group (Deposit and Loan Bank), calculates a potential increase in exports for the country of € 140.3 million. Overall, sales growth to Egypt is expected to maintain a rate of around 4% over the next two years. The lion's share is held by the instrumental mechanics which alone covers about 40% of exports.
From the perspective of the new Silk Road, the country plays an even more strategic role in the transit of cargo in the Mediterranean through the Suez Canal. According to a study carried out in mid-January by Srm, a study center linked to Intesa Sanpaolo, in the last eleven years the traffic from South East Asia to the Mediterranean has increased by 37%, given that it should be read together with the growth in traffic on the Gulf (+77%). The countries of North Africa can represent for Beijing energy hubs for oil, gas and renewable energy.
Kazakhstan is also core to the flow of trade within the Belt and Road. The Central Asian Republic is proposed as one of the hubs of the project among transport corridors between Western Europe, the Caucasus and China, with the so-called Trans-Caspian Way, which aims to cross Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan and Georgia. According to calculations carried out by the government of Astana, this project will reduce the journey time of goods by two thirds. According to the Kazakh statistics institute, in the first nine months of 2018 Italy confirmed its first position among the countries of destination for Kazakh exports, amounting to 44.5 billion dollars.
According to ISTAT data in the period January-September 2018 goods for the amount of 868 million euro were exported to the former Soviet republic, with an increase of 95%. Among the most dynamic product categories are electrical equipment (+470%), machine tools (+97 %), metal products (+75%) and food products (+55%).
The third country on which the seminars will be focused on is Georgia. The country has the opportunity to become one of the transit corridors for trade and energy. An important point is that only one European project is among the projects approved by the Bank for infrastructure and investment and promoted by Beijing. This is the realization of 14.3 kilometers of highway that will favor the decongestioning of traffic to and from the Port of Batumi, the second city of the country. The infrastructure, which has received funds of 114 million euros, is co-financed together with the Asian Development Bank.
(Source:Class Editori)
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