Petra News Agency
Tuesday, March 23, 2004
Conference provides business links, contacts for Iraq rebuilding
AMMAN, March 23 (Petra) - The 2nd International Rebuilding Iraq Conference concluded its works here on Monday, providing a platform for discussions between representatives of Arab and international companies on participating in projects aimed at the reconstruction of the war-torn country.
The conference, to quicken the drive for normalcy of the business environment and commercial climate in neighboring Iraq, brought participants from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iran, Iraq, Israel, Korea Kuwait, Nigeria, Palestine, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Slovakia, Syria, Thailand, Turkey, UAE, UK, USA and Japan.
Furthermore, the conference provided a chance to examine Jordanian-Iraqi cooperation, particularly in the fields of electricity and training as well as exchange of expertise.
At the meeting, the participants voiced hope that the new Iraqi commercial legislation would open the venue to strengthen commercial cooperation and facilitate the growth of Iraq's commercial sector.
They also determined that Iraq was in need of development projects in the fields of communication, water technology and oil industries in order to have sound and solid economic base.
Iraq is the second country in terms of its wealth in natural gas and phosphate, the conference remarked.
The conference, organized by the Jordanian American Business Association, in cooperation with the Amman World Trade Center, managed to attract interested businessmen as well as international organizations to look into available economic opportunities in Iraq.
Representatives from the United Nations, the US Agency for International Development and Iraq's chambers of commerce took part in the event.