The comprehensive economic partnership agreements (CEPA) signed between the UAE, India, Israel, and Indonesia in the first half of 2022 will help the national economy to grow by 2.6 percent in 2030, announced Minister of State for Foreign Trade Thani al-Zeyoudi.

Zeyoudi described the growth percentage as “excellent”, saying that it complements all the various efforts made by the UAE to ensure doubling its national economy from $430 billion to $860 billion by 2030.

The minister indicated that July 2022 will witness the announcement of the signing of a CEPA with Colombia, revealing that after the signing of the CEPA with Indonesia, “we now have access to a large market with 1.7 billion people, including 1.4 billion people in India and 280 million in Indonesia, in addition to nearly 10 million people in Israel.”

UAE’s markets in the Arab world reaches 350 million people, bringing the total markets’ reach of UAE products to more than two billion people.

“About a year ago, we spoke about covering markets that account for four billion people from the Far East to West Africa,” he added.

The three CEPAs have opened large markets to achieve national economic growth, with preliminary figures pointing out that the first CEPA with India is expected to reach a 1.7 percent growth in the national economy by 2030, while the CEPA with Indonesia is expected to achieve a 0.87 percent increase, he said.

He added that the UAE is open to the world’s countries in signing agreements, and those willing to move forward with the agreement signing process will be prioritized.

UAE will sign its fourth CEPA this month with Colombia and is in negotiations with Turkey.

“We have started the CEPA signing negotiation process with several African and East Asian countries and Georgia. The country is also coordinating with Chile in this regard,” he said, adding that there are contacts with other interested countries, such as Mexico.