Azerbaijan calls on Croatian companies to invest in the country’s agriculture, tourism, IT and chemical industry, Rufat Mammadov, head of the Azerbaijan Export and Investment Promotion Foundation (AZPROMO), said.
He added that favorable conditions had been created in Azerbaijan for making investments, as well as for activity in industrial and technology parks.
“Tourism sector is important for us”, he said. “This sphere is new for us and it is growing rapidly. We also see a number of opportunities for cooperation in IT sphere”.
Mammadov stressed that the chemical industry can be another area of cooperation.
“We could also cooperate in the field of pharmaceutics”, he added. “Croatia supplies a large volume of pharmaceutical products to other countries”.
“Azerbaijan almost entirely depends on imports of medications, so the establishment of own production is one of strategically important issues for us”, he said. “We already have several agreements with international investors in this direction, but we want to offer the Croatian companies to explore the possibility of making investments into this sphere.”
Mammadov added that Azerbaijan and Croatia also had great potential for increasing mutual trade in such traditional areas as agriculture, food industry and other industries.
“Azerbaijan could supply, for example, cotton to Croatia”, he said. “We plan to increase cotton production and export volumes in 2016 and 2017”.
Mammadov added that Croatia could also buy Azerbaijani juices, wine, vegetables and fruit.
On the other hand, Croatia could supply various agricultural products, furniture, vehicles, spare parts, and so on, to Azerbaijan.
“The structure of our trade turnover mainly consists of oil products, vessels and their components”, he said. “But we see many opportunities for diversifying our trade turnover”.
According to the Azerbaijani State Customs Committee, the trade turnover between Azerbaijan and Croatia amounted to almost $192 million in January-September, including $141.3 million, which accounted for the export to Croatia. (Trend/Business World Magazine)
