Egypt's minister of economy, Youssif Boutros Ghali, will head a trade delegation on a visit to Baghdad from February 9-13 for talks with Iraqi officials on increasing the Egyptian exports to the Iraqi market within the framework of the UN oil-for-food program, reported the Iranian News Agency (IRNA) Thursday.
"The importance of the visit is that it is likely to help increase
Egyptian exports to Iraq to about 2 billion dollars this year after they hit about 1 billion dollars last year," an official at the Egyptian economy
ministry was quoted as saying.
On January 17, Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan signed in Cairo an agreement on establishing a free trade zone.
Under the terms of the deal, Iraq will abolish all customs barriers blocking Egyptian exports and the two countries will form a single market.
Officials said that the Egyptian-Iraqi economic cooperation was part of efforts to establish an Arab common market in the next few years.
Iraq on Wednesday signed a similar agreement with Syria.
Jordan has recently also showed its interest in setting up a similar agreement with Iraq -- Albawaba.com
© 2001 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
