Eqypt grants 3-year visas to Indian biz visitors

New Delhi, Apr 18: To promote bilateral trade and open investment opportunities between India and Egypt, the Egyptian government today said it will grant three-year visas to business visitors from India.

''Focusing the small and medium enterprises (SMEs), the initiative has been taken to draw investment as well as to promote the tourism sector,'' Egyptian Ambassador to India Mohamed Higazy said at a seminar organised by industry body Ficci on 'Exploring Business Opportunities with Egypt.' Investment cooperation between the two countries would be promoted through joint ventures, capacity building, enhancing people-to-people contact, creating employment opportunities and institutional capacity building at the national and international levels, the Egyptian Ambassador claimed.

''The cooperation in the field of tourism will encompass portion of heritage tourism, joint ventures, investments, knowledge transfer, capacity building, building of social capital, enhancing people-to-people contact, enhancing employability of the youth by need-based skills development programme, and institutional capacity building,'' he added.

Meanwhile, Ficci signed two Memoranda of Understanding (MoU) with Egypt for the promotion of two-way investments and cooperation in the tourism sector.

The MoU on cooperation in promoting investments across sectors in both countries was signed between the General Authority for Investment and Free Zones of Egypt (GAFI) and the industry body.

The other MoU on cooperation in tourism was signed between the Tourist Development Authority (TDA) of Egypt and Ficci.

UNI