Report: foreign direct investment in Arab countries falls by 0.34% in 2018

The Arab Investment & Export Credit Guarantee Corporation, Dhaman, revealed that foreign direct investment (FDI) inflows to Arab countries fell by 0.34 per cent in 2018 to $31.2 billion.

Dhaman said in a report, Sunday, that the new figures come as Arab countries declined in the investment attractiveness index for 2019 declined. The Arab world is now fifth among the world’s seven geographical groups.

Dhaman explained that the Gulf countries continued to lead the Arab States’ performance followed by the Arab Mashreq countries, which ranked second and the Arab Maghreb countries, which was third.

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The report, which is based on the latest data released by the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), said that direct investment inflows to Arab countries accounted for 2.4 per cent of global investment which reached $1.297 trillion in 2018.

“The UAE, Egypt and Oman received the largest share of investment inflows or 68.5 per cent of the total investment inflow to Arab countries,” it said.

According to the report, FDI inflows to the Arab countries rose by 3.4 per cent to reach $889.4 billion in 2018 representing 2.8 per cent of global investment of $ 32.3 trillion.

The report pointed out that the number of new investment projects in the Arab countries increased by 56 projects in 2018 to reach 876 new foreign investment projects compared with 2017.