“The flow of foreign investments in Tunisia edged up 27.5% in 2018 in comparison with 2017, reaching 2, 866. 2 MD compared to a peak of 1,966.9 MD in 2014, said the Foreign Investment Promotion Agency (FIPA)
These investments amounted, in foreign currency, to 1,082.9 million dollars and 916.4 million euros.
Tunisia surpassed the 2.5 billion dinar target for 2018 and eyes a 3 billion figure in 2019.
Foreign investments are made up of portfolio investments with 124.14 MD (+ 6.8% compared to 2017) and foreign direct investment with 2,742 billion dinars (+ 28.6%).
FDI sectoral breakdown for 2018 shows that industry, mainly manufacturing industries, have the lion’s share with 1,129.4 MD (+ 16% in comparison with 2017).
The energy sector lured about 910 MD in FDI, i.e. a rise by 100 MD on last year. Likewise, foreign direct investments in services stood at 626.1 MD in 2018 against 321.3 MD in 2017.
Modest investments were meanwhile directed towards agriculture: 76.5 MD in 2018 against 25.6 MD in 2017.
The flow of foreign direct investments helped carry out 565 investment operations worth 1,832 billion dinars and generate 11, 469 jobs. This includes 110 investment operations worth 99.4 MD that generate 1,458 direct jobs.
455 investment operations mobilized 1,732.6 MD for expansion projects likely to generate about 10, 011 jobs.
Regional discrepancies were brought into the spotlight by FIPA statistics: nearly 58% of the volume of foreign investments were geared towards Greater Tunis (the capital, Manouba, Ben Arous and Ariana), that is 1,062 billion dinars, including 724.6 MD in Tunis, while the northeast attracted 470.7 MD.
France is the top investor with 626.8 MTD (184.3 million euros), followed by Qatar (479.7 MTD that is 141 million euros). Italy is the third largest source of foreign direct investment with 154 MTD (45.4 million euros) and Germany the fourth with 136.4 MD (40.1 million euros).
France, Germany then Italy are leading in the number of jobs generated, while France tops rankings in projects created followed by Italy and Germany.
