Jordan Times
Friday, October 19, 2007
Jordan ascends to 8th rank on
FDI index
By Mohammad Ghazal
AMMAN - Jordan ranked 8th out of 141 countries in inward investment performance
in 2006, according to the 2007 World Investment Report issued by the United
Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
Meanwhile, Jordan Investment Board (JIB) CEO Maen Nsour told The Jordan Times
that investments benefiting from the Investment Promotion Law amounted to JD2.16
billion between January 1 and October 1, 2007. Of this, JD1.7 billion was
invested in the industrial sector.
These figures, he said, mark a drastic improvement over the 2006 investments
during the same period, when JD1.6 billion was invested in the country,
benefiting from the said law, JD1.3 billion of which were in the industrial
sector.
The UNCTAD report is of great significance to the Kingdom, Nsour said, as it
shows that the country has an improved inward performance, as indicated by the
index. It advanced from the 19th place in 2005 to 8th in 2006.
The official said the report indicates that measures taken by the government at
practical and legislative levels have helped boost confidence in the investment
environment of the Kingdom, which now has great potential to attract Foreign
Direct Investment (FDI).
The report ranks Jordan 4th among the top five recipients of FDI inflows in West
Asian countries between 2005-2006, said Nsour.
“We are on the right track, but we should not be satisfied with this. The
government should exert further efforts to create a more conducive investment
environment,” Nsour said.
“There should be continuous work to preserve what was achieved and to build on
it to continue developing the business environment.”
Commenting on the report, analyst and CEO of Envision Consulting Yusef Mansur
attributed the improvement in the inward performance index to “regional factors”
rather than improvements in the country, or to an improvement in business
environment development.
“Last year was exceptional because there were over JD1 billion purchases of Arab
Bank and Housing Bank issuances, and there were also several issuances of new
shareholding companies that were bought by non-residents. That was a one-off
event that does not repeat itself. I expect this year’s figure to be lower,”
Mansur told The Jordan Times.
Moreover, the majority of FDI last year was spurred by privatisation of large
companies and sale of major companies, especially in the telecom and banking
sectors, Mansur said.
“There were also major buyouts in banks,” he noted.
Nsour responded by saying that rankings are based on indices derived from using
three-year moving averages of data of FDI inflows and GDP for the immediate
three past years, including the year in question.
“The matrix of inward FDI in performance and potentials indicates that Jordan is
considered to be a front-runner when it comes to a high FDI potential,” said
Nsour.
Jordan has kept the upward trend in this ranking since early 1990s up to now, he
noted. Between 1993-1995 Jordan ranked 132, between 2002-2004 it ranked 46th,
between 2003-2005 the country ranked 19th and in 2006 it ranked 8th, said Nsour.
According to the UNCTAD report, the West Asian rankings were topped by Turkey,
followed by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Bahrain ranked fifth.