Seychelles, China seek to increase trade, investment |13 May 2015

Some 30 local companies yesterday afternoon took part in a forum where they discussed business opportunities, trade and investment possibilities with Chinese businessmen from the Shandong Province city of Qingdao.

During the official opening of the business forum held at the Savoy Seychelles Resort & Spa under the theme ‘New Business Silk Road to Qingdao new partners for economic cooperation’, three trade agreements were signed.

The first agreement is one between the Qingdao Bureau of commerce and the Seychelles Chamber of Commerce and Industries (SCCI). It was signed by SCCI chairperson Marco Francis and Ma Weigang, the director general of Qingdao Bureau of Commerce.

The second agreement is a strategic cooperation framework between Qingjian International Group Co.Ltd and the Capital Management and Consultancy Ltd represented by Mukesh Valabhji.

The third signing is related to a distribution agreement between Hisense Group and Fairmart represented by its general manager Cliff Cupidon.
Mr Francis said these agreements will strengthen trade relations with China.

“Seychelles already has a very good double taxation treaty with China and we must use these agreements to further strengthen this treaty and use it to its full benefit,” Mr Francis said.

He noted that at present Seychelles imports around US $6 million worth of goods from China while we are exporting around US $1 million worth of goods to China, but as per the agreements trade between our two countries will further increase.

With regard to the importance of such a forum, Mr Francis said “we know that our market and population are very small but we want your companies to look at Seychelles as a hub to do business in Africa and we also want to see partnerships with our local business community.”

It was Finance, trade and the Blue Economy Minister Jean Paul Adam who declared open the forum.

Addressing everyone present Minister Adam said: “Seychelles has continued to surprise China but we are also continued to be surprised by China but we are not surprised by China’s success, on the contrary, we are convinced that China will continue to succeed and we appreciate the mark of confidence in this success by the fact that such a forum by Qingdao in partnership with the Seychelles investment Board (SIB) has been organised here.”

He noted that since establishing diplomatic relations in 1976, the friendly cooperation between the two countries has seen a smooth and steady development.

“From this cooperation Seychelles has benefitted in terms of scholarships, infrastructure such as the Palais de Justice and several primary and secondary schools on our three main islands among others. We have also seen huge increase in the number of Chinese tourists who visit our shores, figures show that 13,349 Chinese tourists visited our shores in 2009 and we are very confident that this figure would grow well above 15,000 this year,” Minister Adam said.

While this ranks China as our sixth most prominent market currently, we have no doubt that it could be the number one in the near future,” added Mr Adam.

SIB chief executive Rupert Simeon said Qingdao is well known for its Silk Road and Seychelles being the closest port to China can be used as a hub for the Asian country to do business in Africa.

He noted that doing business with Qingdao will bring Seychelles a lot of exposure.
Mr Simeon added that the businesses from Qingdao taking part in the forum are from sectors like infrastructure, banking, import/export, shipping maritime and construction.

Guests at the forum included Chinese ambassador Li Lixian, numerous stakeholders from the business community among others.