OBJECTIVES:

For the very first time a new EU-Palestine Business Forum is held on the margins of the 4th official meeting of the Platform, bringing together 200 to 300 business leaders, bankers, investors and government representatives. The main objective of the Business Forum is to better mobilise private and institutional investors towards the Palestinian economy by means of establishing an avenue for public-private dialogue in the framework of the EU – Palestine Investment Platform.    

The new Business Forum will help expand the engagement of the private sector in the workings of the Platform, it will offer the business community a forum to engage with policy makers on strategic priorities and policies for investment, to learn about prospective investment opportunities and available financing possibilities. 

The Business Form will work to better engage the Palestinian business community with financiers and investors of ‘Team Europe’, which includes the EU, its Member States and European Financial Institutions. It will help creating linkages between investment opportunities promoted by Palestinian partners with financing possibilities from Team Europe, helping boost private and institutional investment flowing into Palestine.

BACKGROUND:

The EU – Palestine Investment Platform was established by the European Union and Palestinian Authority in an effort to foster policy dialogue on investment and to help better identify, prioritise, coordinate and promote investment opportunities that the EU External Investment Plan offers through its many instruments in Palestine. A key objective of the Platform is to better attract investment into Palestine through mobilisation of additional public, institutional and private financing that contributes to Palestine’s political, policy and reform priorities

Since the launching of the Platform in December 2020, three high-level meetings convened under the patronage of the Prime Minister of Palestine and the European Union Representative. Two working groups were established on matters of SMEs Finance and Energy Finance meeting three times under the auspices of the Governor of the Palestine Monetary Authority and the Chairman of the Palestinian Energy and Natural Resources Authority.     

Moreover, in December 2022 the EU issued the second edition of the EU-Palestine Investment Review detailing and analysing all investment projects promoted by the EU, its Member States and European Financial Institutions as ‘Team Europe’ in Palestine. It reveals that over the last years European partners stepped-up their investments into the Palestinian economy. Of the total amount of EUR 1.82 billion, around 60% were committed only in the last two years showing a remarkable growth in mobilisation of finance for Palestine.