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The Federal Minister for Privatisation and Investment, Dr. Abdul Hafeez
Shaikh has left for Kazakhstan to represent Pakistan in the 14th Annual
Symposium being held in connection with Twenty-Eighth annual meeting of the
Islamic Development Bank (IDB) Board of Governors, which is scheduled in
Almaty, Kazakhstan on 2nd September 2003. Dr. Hafeez Shaikh will be the
keynote speaker at the symposium. The main theme of the Symposium is
"Cooperation among OIC member Countries for Intra-Investment".
Dr. Hafeez Shaikh in his key note address to the Symposium will highlight as
to how the alternative economic networking opportunities available to
different member countries can be brought together to strengthen OIC's
networking capacity - and how this can be used to amplify the power of the OIC
economic network. Dr. Hafeez Shaikh will also highlight the necessary
onditions and the way for the member countries to actually engage as effective
network participants and the compelling benefits to individual member
countries to contribute by enhancing the OIC economic network.
Looked at from many perspectives, the Organization of Islamic Countries
(OIC) is a large cluster of nodes. Of the 191 member countries of the
United Nations, 57 countries (or approximately 30% of the total) are members
of OIC. The member countries of the OIC have a combined population of over
1.25 billion, or close to 20% of the world population. Moreover, OIC member
countries have some of the highest population growth rates in the world. In
geographic terms, the OIC members occupy 17% of the world's landmass. These
countries cover a wide range of fauna and temperate zones and possess some of
the most abundant energy and mineral resources in the world. In 2000, the OIC
members produced 50% of the world's oil and supplied 40% of the global
exports of raw materials.
Trade and Foreign Direct Investment are the two most important indicators of
the economic networking effect. In both these categories, the OIC member
countries fare poorly as well. In 2001, the total OIC member countries'
exports of merchandise amounted to $520.2 billion, which was only 8.6% of
total world merchandise exports in that year. Despite this relatively
miniscule figure, this was in fact quite an achievement for the OIC. It
represented the highest share in world merchandise exports achieved by the OIC
member countries in the last decade - their lowest share being the 6.4% of
total world merchandise exports that they achieved in 1998. Similarly, the
imports of the OIC member countries are a small portion of world trade.
In 2001, the total OIC member countries' imports of merchandise amounted to
about $421 billion, or 6.5% of total world merchandise imports.