The Italian-Azerbaijani Chamber of Commerce held a meeting with the Azerbaijani SME Development Agency to discuss the country’s opportunities for cooperation with Italian companies and the organization of joint events to involve business communities of Italy and Azerbaijan.
Italy was Azerbaijan’s top trade partner in 2020 with the mutual trade amounting to $4.5 billion while Azerbaijan was the largest supplier of crude oil to Italy. Azerbaijan accounts for more than 90 percent of Italy’s total trade with the South Caucasus countries. Likewise, Azerbaijan’s overall investment in Italy’s economy is estimated at 1.7 billion euros – $2bn –, while Italy invested about 770 million euros – $910.8M – in Azerbaijan.
Over 100 Italian companies are registered in the country, operating in various sectors, which have contracts worth over 10 billion euros – 11.8 billion dollars – for Azerbaijani projects both outside and inside Azerbaijan. The volume of the trade turnover between the two countries amounted to $2.8 billion during the period of January-May 2021. Out of the total turnover, exports amounted to $2.7 billion and imports to $155.3 million.
Azerbaijan is, therefore, a territory that could bring a lot to the Italian economy, also considering that the Azerbaijani Agency, as stated by its Business Development Chairman Orkhan Mammadov, is very keen and interested in expanding relations with the competent agencies Italian. In this regard, it was noted during the meeting that the Agency’s accession to the Chamber and the documents signed on cooperation with the various Italian institutions will positively contribute to the development of existing relations between the business communities of the two countries and the establishment of new business partnerships.
