Minister of State for Emigration and Egyptian Expatriates’ Affairs Soha el Gendy, has stressed that Egypt has been exerting great efforts to boost economic cooperation and regional integration between the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA) countries since joining the body in 1998.
The minister’s remarks came on Thursday on the occasion of the Emigration Ministry’s hosting of the two-day meetings of COMESA regional teamwork, which are held for the first time at the ministry HQ in the New Administrative Capital.
The meetings tackle the issue of free movement of individuals as an integral part of efforts to facilitate trade, according to a statement issued by the Emigration Ministry.
COMESA was established ‘as an organization of free independent sovereign states which have agreed to co-operate in developing their natural and human resources for the good of all their people’ and as such it has a wide-ranging series of objectives which necessarily include in its priorities the promotion of peace and security in the region.
With its 21 Member States, population of over 583 million a Gross Domestic Product of $805 billion, a global export/import trade in goods worth $ 324 billion, COMESA forms a major market place for both internal and external trading.
