TUNISIA. The steps that Tunisia is taking to integrate further into the world economy and the achievements it has reached at political, economic, social and cultural levels were discussed at a private meeting between the President of Tunisia Zine El Abidine Ben Ali and Oxford Business Group’s Chairman Michael Benson-Colpi, which took place at the President’s palace in Carthage.

In an exclusive interview with Oxford Business Group (OBG), the highly acclaimed global publishing, research and consultancy firm, President Ben Ali said that by adopting an approach which has comprehensive reforms at its core, Tunisia has successfully created a diversified economy, capable of interacting with and adapting to changes in the world economy.

“Today, our ambition is to give a fresh impetus to the action of economic development and to accelerate the pace of reforms, in order to further consolidate competitiveness, achieve further integration within the world economy, and improve the business climate so as to make Tunisia a regional pole for business and services,” he said.

The interview with President Ben Ali appears in The Report: Tunisia 2009, the most comprehensive English language report on the country’s investment and business opportunities ever published, which has been has been produced by OBG and is published this week.

The report offers a detailed guide for foreign investors, alongside a wide range of interviews with the most prominent political, economic and business figures, including the two-page interview with President Ben Ali. An extended version of this interview will be placed on the web in both English and French.

Oxford Business Group’s Chairman, Michael Benson-Colpi, highlighted the positive, long-standing relationship that exists between OBG and Tunisia. “Tunisia was the first country that OBG ventured into when we began producing reports on North Africa,” he said. “That was in 2003.

Since then, President Ben Ali has made a personal contribution to each report that OBG has produced on the country. This in itself is a remarkable testimony to the positive relations that exist between the Tunisian Presidency and OBG.”

Benson-Colpi added that Tunisia has made impressive progress in pursuing trade dialogue, not only with the business it is doing with Europe, but also by venturing further afield into new territories, most notably the Asian markets. This, he said, was due in no small measure to the political stability that Tunisia enjoys.

Tunisia’s aim to integrate further into the world economy is highlighted by President Ben Ali in his interview with OBG. “This requires mobilising new sources of growth, further developing export-oriented sectors by enhancing the available preferential advantages, and consolidating our country's position in foreign markets through achieving better adaptation to the evolution of international demand, and promoting the mechanisms of partnership and foreign investment,” President Ben Ali said.

The Report: Tunisia 2009 marks the culmination of more than six months of groundbreaking field research by a team of analysts from OBG, assessing trends and developments in all major sectors of the economy, including energy, industry, finance, banking, tourism, transport and real estate. It forms part of the range of OBG's publications, which are renowned as leading sources of information on developing and emerging economies around the world.

Available in print form and online, The Report: Tunisia 2009 is the most comprehensive report on the country’s investment and business opportunities ever published.

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