UAE-Europe trade treaty in place by the end of 2008
23 October 2008
A long-awaited free trade agreement between the UAE and Europe could finally be in place by the end of the year, according to France’s minister of Foreign Trade as reported by Gulf news online.
"The idea is to have a clear frame and clear rules for business, trade and investment. Discussions are going on, with tariff barriers for trade and legal and fiscal rules. We hope very much, under the presidency of Nicolas Sarkozy, it will be possible to have a result before the end of this year and we are working very hard for that," Anne-Marie Idrac, told Gulf News during her visit to the French pavilion at Gitex yesterday.
Idrac said it is important to have a "zone of stability" and to work as a group between the six countries of the Gulf on one hand and the 27 European countries on the other. On the existing trade between the two countries, Idrac said it is growing, especially with the plethora of mega-projects currently underway in the UAE.
"(Trade) is good which means it is growing and for Europe it is interesting and for France it is interesting because we export, especially in many infrastructure sectors- transport, energy, water. And we hope that it will not only be possible to contribute to all the very, very exciting projects there are in infrastructure here but also to diversify, including in construction," the minister added. She said projects here in the UAE, including those involved with infrastructure have not been hit by the financial crisis that is crippling other countries around the world, like the US and Europe. "It is interesting to hear that the schedule and planning of infrastructure programmes, especially transport, seem not to be affected by the financial crisis because they are a very high priority of the government," Idrac said. She also said France is already interested in all the UAE projects on the table and said French companies have contributed a healthy amount to the Dubai Metro. "For example, on the Metro, existing figures of commitment from French companies is more than Dh6 billion (over 1 billion euro)," Idrac said