HE Premier Says Flourishing Economy Opens Investment Opportunities for Private Sector

Doha, December 11 (QNA) - HE the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabor Al Thani said that the Qatari economy maintains its growth and boom despite all the unfavorable circumstances the international economy is witnessing . This , HE said provides many great and diversified opportunities for investment by local, Arab and global private sectors. HE the Premier said in keynote speech before the opening session of the Euromoney Qatar Conference held here Tuesday that these opportunities come in an atmosphere of cooperation between the public and private sectors, wherein the government continued reforms to improve the free business environment and diversify the base of the economy away from oil and gas sector. He added that Qatar's position as a regional financial hub helped the growth of the private sector outside the oil and gas industry, this growth was cemented by the government belief that private sector is the second wing to the continued growth, prosperity and achieving the objectives of "Qatar National Vision 2030," saying that without the active participation of this sector, it is difficult to achieve those goals. HE noted that the rise of Qatar's rank in the World Bank's report (Doing Business 2012) to the 36the internationally and third among Arab countries, reflects the efforts done by the government in creating the right climate for private sector to achieve growth, especially that 2012 saw improvement in Qatar's position in several areas regarding those indicators most notably Improved Access to Credit, where Its position jumped from 138th in 2011 to 98 in 2012. Qatar is working to build a strong and progressing economy through the establishment of advanced infrastructure to serve the various economic sectors, he said explaining that this stems from Qatar National Vision 2030, which aims to achieve sustainable development in various economic sectors. This strategy seeks to realize this vision through laying the institutional bases for sustainable economic growth and diversity, formulating legislative structures and preparing economic atmosphere conductive to pushing forwards the wheel of growth and productivity, said HE Premier. He noted that this contributed to realizing many achievements during the first year of the 2011/2016 strategy. Growth rate surpassed real terms 14% during 2011, he said explaining that internal balance of the State was shown in the general budget realized a surplus of 5 % of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) while the external balance, represented in the balance of payments' current account has witnessed a surplus of 30% of GDP. "In spite of this upswing in the economic activity, the inflation and unemployment rates remained low, at less than 2% and 1.5 % respectively," he said. HE the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabor Al Thani stressed that the government attaches utmost importance to the investment climate and works hard to create an appropriate climate to attract investors. He went on saying that the government has sought to create additional institutions that help to create suitable investment climate in Qatar, simultaneously with the release of a package of laws and regulations to help stabilization, which represents the key for an attractive and secure investment climate, adding that Qatar has ranked the 11th among 144 countries covered by the Global Competitiveness Index in 2012 and the 37th among 187 covered by the Human Development Index in 2011. "Qatar sought to develop flexible regulatory methods to organize the work of commercial projects, significantly among this, is the low level of corruption which is less than the global average as Qatar ranks the 22nd globally out of 183 countries surveyed in the corruption perception index 2011," HE the Premier said adding " this represents a direct result of the presence of high qualitative legal framework." HE then explained that Qatar ranks the 10th among the 144 countries surveyed for the Judiciary Independence Index 2012, and ranked the 25th globally and 2nd in the Arab World in terms of Economic Freedom. He noted that the financial developments witnessed by the State of Qatar during the past few years have been reflected by improving the country's credit rating issued by the global agency, which depends on measuring political and economic stability of the country in addition to the credit worthiness of each state. HE the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Sheikh Hamad bin Jassim bin Jabor Al Thani further said that the sovereign credit rating of Qatar sow stability as the Standard and Poor's agency has lifted a long-term credit rating of Qatar to (AA) from (AA-) in June 2010, and kept this rate at (AA) in July in 2012, which reflects the agency's opinion on the richness of Qatar's economy and the strong financial performance of the state. He noted that Moody's Agency has classified the long-term bonds of Qatar at (AA2) in September 2012, indicating that this classification is supported by factors of multiple strengths of the Qatari economy, sustained economic growth in addition to the strong performance of the oil and gas sector and high levels of wealth and continuing surplus in the state's budget. HE the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister said that the hosting of this conference be the State of Qatar comes within the context of its support for the international gatherings to discuss and study the developments and transformations taking place in the structure of the international financial sector with a view to producing a viable vision for the future of the sector and its role in achieving the long sought-for economic development. He expressed hope that the discussions of the conference would effectively lead to the formulation of futuristic mechanisms and visions that can consolidate the role of financial sector in enhancing the stability of the international economy and contributing to its growth. (END)