Egyptian government is aiming at enhancing and boosting Italian investments in Egypt since Italy is "Egypt's first trade partner among EU states", Investment Minister Ashraf Salman said Friday. The minister made these remarks during his visit to Italy in which he met with the Italian Minister of Economic Development Federica Guidi and a number of Italian officials. During the meeting, the two parties have discussed the development in the economic relations between Egypt and Italy as the second is one of the most important markets for the Egyptian exports. Salman's two-day visit also discussed the mechanisms of executing different economic cooperation programmes as well as the agreements that have been signed during president Abdel Fattah al-Sisi's last visit to Italy. The signed agreements included different fields notably a wind power plant project in addition to a number of agreements in petroleum, natural gas, electricity, and furniture fields. The two parties also talked over the preparations for the Egyptian-Italian summit which is set to take place next March and considered as an important step to enhance bilateral relations notably the economic ones. Salman asserted that Italy is an important economic partner for Egypt since the Italian investments in Egypt are diversified notably in petroleum and power sectors. He pointed out to the importance of making use of the several resources that the region enjoys to positively. The minister added that there are a lot of available investment opportunities remarkably in manufacturing, infrastructure and tourism sectors. Egypt has achieved a 4.2 percent increase in growth rates in fiscal year 2014-15 and aims at boosting it to 5-5.5 percent in during current fiscal year, Slaman noted. In addition, Egypt's unemployment rate have been declined from 13.6 percent to 12.6 percent in fiscal year 2014-15. On other side, minister Guidi expressed he appreciations to the Egyptian efforts to support means of mutual cooperation notably in investment and trade fields, noting that Italy is keen to deepen the cooperation with Egypt. Guidi hopes by her anticipated visit to Egypt next February that she would discuss Egypt's proposals to boost bilateral cooperation as well as find Egyptian partners to participate in joint projects with Italy.
