Riyadh-Saudi investment company "Hadi company", decided to freez its planned project in Sudan for the production of wheat and other food commodities, untill the Sudanese government to ease its ban on conversion of foreign corporate profits abroad.
Sudan seeks to attract investments in agricultural land and livestock from Gulf companies, which in turn seeks to provide food supplies for their countries.
Although some of the projects(that receives Sudanese government
support ) from countries such as Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Qatar have started, the agricultural trades financed by the private sector faces obstacles represented by the stringent restrictions imposed by the Sudan on the conversion of foreign currency abroad.
Central Bank of Sudan, which is suffering a severe shortage of foreign currency made’t difficult to convert dollars to companies operating outside the oil sector, which is dominated by Chinese companies.
The head of the Saudi company Mohammed al-Barqawi said that he was looking with a Turkish partner on the project of 100 thousand acres for the production of wheat, soybeans, sorghum, animal feed in the northern Sudanese state, which borders Egypt.
Reuters quoted the director of the company which is based in Riyadh -based as saying, "The government needs to establish a system that allows to transfer some of the profits, and authorities need to pursue it ... and if they do not will fail many of the projects."
And went on "Sudan has a good legal framework for investment, especially since it allows to transfer 60% of the profits, but they must apply this framework ... The problem with the central bank that whenever you want to transfer funds say that they do not have dollars."
Barqawi was speaking on the sidelines of a conference about Arab food security in Khartoum, where the government and officials of the League of Arab States are seeking to collect investments from Gulf companies in particular. Barqawi said, "unless they solve this problem, there is no feasibility of such a conference ... nothing will happen in this case.
Source: Sky News