Continuing his travels round the world to promote quality European Union (EU) farm products, Phil Hogan, commissioner for agriculture and rural development, is in Saudi Arabia on 7-9 November 2017 and Iran on 10-13 November 2017, accompanied by a delegation of businesses from the EU agri-food sector to facilitate trade relations. The delegation of around a hundred senior representatives of EU companies and associations in the agri-food industry includes participants from around the EU (see the complete lists for Saudi Arabia and Iran).
The delegation members will hold business meetings with their counterparts in the two countries, as well as a number of networking events and visits to food retailers (see draft programmes). The aim is to boost EU trade in food and agricultural products with the two Middle Eastern nations: at present, Saudi Arabia exports around €62m worth of agri-food products to the EU, and imports some €4.5bn; Iran imports EU agri-food products worth around €728m a year, and exports around €468m of agri-food products to the EU.
Commissioner Hogan’s trip comes within the framework of the European Union's promotion policy for agri-food products, designed to help producers sell their EU farm products in an increasingly competitive global marketplace, at the same time as delivering jobs and growth at home. Previous trips for Commissioner Hogan included visits to Canada (1-3 May 2017), Columbia and Mexico (8-12 February 2017), Vietnam and Indonesia (02-09 November 2016) and China and Japan (16-22 April 2016).
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