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FICIL's 22nd High Council meeting: Building Trust

Jun 06, 2018
SSE Riga, Soros Auditorium, Strelnieku 4a, Riga

The Foreign Investors' Council in Latvia (FICIL) and the Latvian government held the 22nd annual High Council meeting to discuss improvement of investment environment. A welcoming reception was hosted on the night of June 6 at the Gutenberg terrace to commence the program.

This year's High Council meeting started off with the internal meeting, in which HC delegates received a preview of the upcoming two days and main goals for the High Council event. This was the first High Council meeting for Honorary Chairperson Charlotte Norrby, SEB.

The guest speaker for the internal meeting was the Deputy Prime Minister, Minister for Economics Arvils Ašeradens who gave his thoughts on the investment attractiveness of Latvia. During his presentation, he offered general insights concerning Latvia's economic development, the availability and productivity of labor, the quality of higher education, the country's fragmented digitalization policy, and other relevant issues affecting Latvia's economy.

The second part of the day was devoted to the public panel discussion "Building Trust!" representing two main priorities: digitalization and fight against economic crime.

Accordingly, the discussion was split into two parts:

1) "Small country, big potential: opportunities for Latvia in the digital economy",

2) "Tackling economic crime: bridging the gaps and being prepared for the new reality".

The main High Council event - the High Council meeting with the Government of Latvia - took place on June 7 in the Cabinet of Ministers. Government representatives introduced investors to the latest trends in the national economy (PDF).

During the meeting, Chairperson of the FICIL Board, Zlata Elksniņa-Zaščirinska presented FICIL's vision regarding the key things to be achieved: the main concerns of foreign investors and progress of SMART goals that FICIL had presented for government at the 21st High Council. The FICIL's Position papers on Digitalization, Higher Education Policy, Waste Management and Energy Sector Policy, Security and Protection of Investment, Availability and Quality of Labor, Proposals for the Improvement of Combating Economic and Financial Crime, as well as the view on Macroeconomic policy were submitted to the Government.

At the end of the meeting, FICIL Honorary Chairperson, Charlotte Norrby and the Prime Minister shook hands to demonstrate trust and agreed on following future cooperation priorities:

1) bettering education;

2) fighting against economic crime;

3) upholding a digital agenda.

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