Viñal, Lema and Sendagorta during the event./ Photo: TD
Eduardo González. 12/07/2018
The Asian southeast, especially Malaysia, is offered as a great investment opportunity for Spanish engineering companies thanks to the increase of the domestic demand and the great investment plans in infrastructures set in motion by the countries of the ASEAN.
This is the main conclusion of the seminar The Asian southeast: a present market for Spanish engineering companies, held yesterday at Tecniberia in Madrid and in which investment opportunities in the Asian southeast in general, and in Malaysia in particular, for Spanish companies were analyzed.
According to the director general for North America, Asia and the Pacific of the Foreign Ministry, Fidel Sendagorta, Spain has for 2022 the “ambitious but realistic objective” of increasing by ten points the percentage of its exports to Asia to reach the average of the EU (20%), an objective that “should be attainable for a Spain whose solution to the crisis has been based on a very powerful foreign sector”.
“We have solid assets to face it, such as being members of the EU, which provides us with the critical mass of negotiation that we do not have as an individual country”, continued Sendagorta, who was accompanied during the event by the president of Tecniberia, Juan Ignacio Lema, and Diego Viñal, partner of the law firm AVCO.
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Spain aspires to increase its exports to Asia by ten points to reach the European average
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Furthermore, he warned, the Brexit could be “an opportunity for Spain” because the Asian countries that had focused their investments in Europe on the United Kingdom until now “will have to distribute them among the rest of the countries”.
Moreover, Asia offers other market opportunities for Spain, such as the “rise of middle classes with purchasing power and consumption and travel habits comparable to the countries of the south of Europe”, with special incidence in the food and agriculture sector and tourism, and the “fast increase of the urban population”, which has generated a demand of urban services (solid waste management, drinking water or transport) interesting for Spanish companies.
Nevertheless, he warned, there are also “concerning trends”, such as the current trade war between China and the United States, “a very clear case of the phenomenon that goes beyond our control”. “The countries of the region are directly or indirectly affected, because they are part of the chain of value of the Chinese products that are exported to the United States”, he explained. “It is not the case of Spain, but I am curious to see to which point can this affect us directly or indirectly”, he admitted.
