Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said Tuesday that Egypt hopes Common Market for Southern and Eastern Africa (COMESA) members reach economic integration and realize "the aspirations of their peoples to create the African economic community."
Mubarak’s remarks came during the opening ceremony of the sixth COMESA summit in Cairo, reported Egypt.online.
He also expressed his confidence that the success in activating a Free Trade Area will be the best incentive to the member states still outside the FTA to quickly join it.
“Accession to the FTA is a necessity to face the successive international changes, to maximize the volume of our trade exchange in a manner that enhances development efforts in the member states, to open new export markets, and to redouble volume of production.”
“This will create new job opportunities and tangibly help curb the unemployment problem from which our countries as well as all world countries suffer,” he noted.
Mubarak stressed that “Egypt has called for this significant economic conference with a view to conducting an open and comprehensive dialogue, not only between those in charge of economy, trade and investment sectors in member states, but also between them and other concerned institutions on the international arena.”
According to its website, COMESA functions as an organization of "free independent sovereign states which have agreed to cooperate in developing their natural and human resources for the good of all their people.
"With its 20 member states and population of 385 million it forms a major integrated trading block," says the organization's site - Albawaba.com
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