Thursday, 6 February 2014 00:00
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The Ministry of Investment Promotion and the Board of Investment of Sri Lanka in collaboration with the EU Chamber of Commerce in Sri Lanka and Sri Lanka Embassy in France conducted a successful investment promotion mission in Paris, France, targeting key French companies.
The objective of the mission was to target French companies and to showcase Sri Lanka in a positive light as a politically stable country with a continually growing economy, offering ideal opportunities for investment.
The main meeting was with ‘The movement de Enterprises France’ (MEDEF) at their Headquarters in Paris. The movement de Enterprises France (MEDEF) is the largest union of Employers in France. MEDEF has 750,000 member companies and targets investments overseas.
Sri Lanka was represented by Faiszer Mustapha, Deputy Minister of Investment Promotion, Prof. Karunaratne Hangawatte, Ambassador of Sri Lanka to France, Dilip S. Samarasinghe, Director (Media and Publicity) BOI, Niranjala de Mel, Executive Director, European Chamber of Commerce and Yoshita Jayasooriya, Secretary, Sri Lanka Embassy, France.
The Minister gave a broad overview of the improved conditions in Sri Lanka since the end of the conflict and Government policy.
Samarasinghe conducted a presentation on investment opportunities in Sri Lanka, in the French language, which highlighted incentives, target sectors and future prospects. Sri Lanka’s Ambassador summed up and also discussed some possibilities for investment such as in the waste to energy sector where France is a world leader.
Over 20 leading French companies were represented at the meeting which included Solar Direct (solar panels) Eurocopter (helicopter manufacturer) Total (oil), SNCF (railways), Alstom (energy solutions and transport), Lafarge (cement manufacturer) Degremont (water solutions), AFD (French Development Agency), BNP (Paribas, leading French banking group) Bouygues (leading French infrastructure and building company) UBI France (French agency for export promotion), and PMU (French horse racing authority).The mission created considerable interest about Sri Lanka in France. Also participating was Jean Francois Poli, French Embassy Commercial Counsellor. MEDEF agreed to send an inward business delegation from France to Sri Lanka in 2014 drawn from its members. This was followed by one-to-one meetings where Deputy Minister Faiszer Mustapha and the rest of the delegation met with French companies.
