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Uphill struggle for Gulf investors in N.Africa
Tue 3 Jul 2007, 12:21 GMT
By Tom Pfeiffer
RABAT (Reuters) - Arab Gulf petrodollars are flooding into North Africa, helping investment-starved economies create jobs and help overcome poverty.
On paper, that is.
In reality, question marks hang over projects ranging from a vast free trade zone in Libya to a $5 billion aluminium refinery in Algeria and a reported $14 billion Tunis tourism complex.
Arab Gulf ruling families have ploughed oil profits into new industries to reduce their reliance on the energy sector but growth is slowing in many of those domestic industries, forcing them to look further afield for new opportunities.
Political and cultural links should give them a competitive advantage in North Africa, where decades of sluggish private sector activity have seen the region's economies fall far behind their wealthy European neighbours.
Progress is held back by red tape and graft. To get projects off the ground, foreign investors must play a nebulous game of political patronage where business rationale is subsumed by complex private interests, analysts say.
Morocco ranks at 115 out of 175 in a World Bank survey of business-friendly countries and Algeria is at 120. Libya, emerging from heavy economic sanctions, does not have a ranking.
In Morocco, the only North African country with no oil and keen to draw inward investment, the government has fast-tracked investment projects by streamlining the country's cumbersome business rules for the benefit of Gulf developers.
"Morocco is the place they'll probably get things moving fastest but Algeria and Libya are the ones where you see most potential," said David Butter, Middle East business editor at the Economist Intelligence Unit.
"In those countries there is a need for effective project management and there's no shortage of resources. It's just a question of getting things done."
SLOW PROGRESS
Dubai property firm Emaar has teamed up with one of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's sons for its biggest project by land area, the Zowara-Abu Kemash Development Zone in Libya. The project has been delayed as details are worked out.
Tunisian media said last month that Dubai Holding would invest $14 billion in a tourism hub north of the capital Tunis but nothing has been heard since.
Business people in Algeria say Africa's second-biggest country is crying out for foreign investment and exposure to global best practice in services, where its record is poor.
Government officials agree the country lacks management expertise and technology and hope to more than double foreign investment outside the core oil and gas industry to $7 billion in 2007, with the bulk of the rise coming from Arab companies.
Kuwaiti and Egyptian firms have found success in Algeria's telecoms sector, but only a handful of large-scale projects involving Gulf firms have come to fruition, such as a 1,200 MW power station at Hadjret En Nouss.
Two United Arab Emirates firms signed a deal with state energy firm Sonatrach to build a $5 billion aluminium smelter with annual capacity of 700,000 tonnes, according to a UAE media report in March. Nothing has been heard of it since.
The local press has reported talks on a multibillion dollar project to modernise part of the Algiers waterfront involving five-star hotels, business centres and posh villas, but there has been no official word on the details.
"The Algerians are trying to draw large-scale investment to petrochemicals through firms like Sabic (Saudi Basic Industries Corp.) but there's still some stickiness in getting these things off the ground," said Butter.
RISK TAKERS
The picture is different in Morocco, where Gulf investors have signed up for projects worth as much as $30 billion over and brought some of Dubai's pazzaz to the kingdom.
Dubai Holding is working round the clock in the sleepy capital Rabat, rapidly transforming the Bouregreg estuary in a $2.7 billion project to add walkways, hotels, shops and a marina under the impressed, if bemused, gaze of locals.
Work began last week on the $350 million Mazagan luxury resort south of Casablanca. Qatar investors have launched a $600 million costal complex of hotels, holiday homes and a golf course near Tangier in the north.
Gulf investors still lie far behind the European Union in North Africa when it comes to long-term investment in high value-added, job creating industries such as auto-parts, textiles or outsourcing.
But with their abundant capital and strong political contacts, they appear the most able to swallow risk and push into an uncertain economic landscape.
"When the perceived risks are higher, so will be the expected returns," said Steve Brice, regional head of research at Standard Chartered Bank. "Investors need to be rewarded for efforts and risks, otherwise the investment will not be made."
source:
http://africa.reuters.com/business/news/usnBAN348023.html
------
Uphill struggle for Gulf investors in N.Africa
Tue 3 Jul 2007, 12:21 GMT
By Tom Pfeiffer
RABAT (Reuters) - Arab Gulf petrodollars are flooding into North Africa, helping investment-starved economies create jobs and help overcome poverty.
On paper, that is.
In reality, question marks hang over projects ranging from a vast free trade zone in Libya to a $5 billion aluminium refinery in Algeria and a reported $14 billion Tunis tourism complex.
Arab Gulf ruling families have ploughed oil profits into new industries to reduce their reliance on the energy sector but growth is slowing in many of those domestic industries, forcing them to look further afield for new opportunities.
Political and cultural links should give them a competitive advantage in North Africa, where decades of sluggish private sector activity have seen the region's economies fall far behind their wealthy European neighbours.
Progress is held back by red tape and graft. To get projects off the ground, foreign investors must play a nebulous game of political patronage where business rationale is subsumed by complex private interests, analysts say.
Morocco ranks at 115 out of 175 in a World Bank survey of business-friendly countries and Algeria is at 120. Libya, emerging from heavy economic sanctions, does not have a ranking.
In Morocco, the only North African country with no oil and keen to draw inward investment, the government has fast-tracked investment projects by streamlining the country's cumbersome business rules for the benefit of Gulf developers.
"Morocco is the place they'll probably get things moving fastest but Algeria and Libya are the ones where you see most potential," said David Butter, Middle East business editor at the Economist Intelligence Unit.
"In those countries there is a need for effective project management and there's no shortage of resources. It's just a question of getting things done."
SLOW PROGRESS
Dubai property firm Emaar has teamed up with one of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's sons for its biggest project by land area, the Zowara-Abu Kemash Development Zone in Libya. The project has been delayed as details are worked out.
Tunisian media said last month that Dubai Holding would invest $14 billion in a tourism hub north of the capital Tunis but nothing has been heard since.
Business people in Algeria say Africa's second-biggest country is crying out for foreign investment and exposure to global best practice in services, where its record is poor.
Government officials agree the country lacks management expertise and technology and hope to more than double foreign investment outside the core oil and gas industry to $7 billion in 2007, with the bulk of the rise coming from Arab companies.
Kuwaiti and Egyptian firms have found success in Algeria's telecoms sector, but only a handful of large-scale projects involving Gulf firms have come to fruition, such as a 1,200 MW power station at Hadjret En Nouss.
Two United Arab Emirates firms signed a deal with state energy firm Sonatrach to build a $5 billion aluminium smelter with annual capacity of 700,000 tonnes, according to a UAE media report in March. Nothing has been heard of it since.
The local press has reported talks on a multibillion dollar project to modernise part of the Algiers waterfront involving five-star hotels, business centres and posh villas, but there has been no official word on the details.
"The Algerians are trying to draw large-scale investment to petrochemicals through firms like Sabic (Saudi Basic Industries Corp.) but there's still some stickiness in getting these things off the ground," said Butter.
RISK TAKERS
The picture is different in Morocco, where Gulf investors have signed up for projects worth as much as $30 billion over and brought some of Dubai's pazzaz to the kingdom.
Dubai Holding is working round the clock in the sleepy capital Rabat, rapidly transforming the Bouregreg estuary in a $2.7 billion project to add walkways, hotels, shops and a marina under the impressed, if bemused, gaze of locals.
Work began last week on the $350 million Mazagan luxury resort south of Casablanca. Qatar investors have launched a $600 million costal complex of hotels, holiday homes and a golf course near Tangier in the north.
Gulf investors still lie far behind the European Union in North Africa when it comes to long-term investment in high value-added, job creating industries such as auto-parts, textiles or outsourcing.
But with their abundant capital and strong political contacts, they appear the most able to swallow risk and push into an uncertain economic landscape.
"When the perceived risks are higher, so will be the expected returns," said Steve Brice, regional head of research at Standard Chartered Bank. "Investors need to be rewarded for efforts and risks, otherwise the investment will not be made."
source:
http://africa.reuters.com/business/news/usnBAN348023.html