Manama: Bahrain has been ranked 18th in the 2015 Islamic Growth Markets Investment Index in terms of investment potential within the OIC umbrella.
Thompson Reuters, the world’s leading provider of intelligent information for businesses and professionals, in partnership with Dinar Standard, an Islamic markets research and advisory firm, presented the key findings of Islamic Growth Markets Investment Report 2015 during the Global Islamic Investment Gateway conference in Bahrain.
According the report, Bahrain ranked among the top 30 OIC economies in the 2015 Islamic Growth Markets Investment Index.
Launching Thomson Reuters Dinar Standard Islamic Growth Markets Investment Report 2015
The report also creates for the first time an investment index ranking OIC members’ investment potential linked to key sectors across the region.
The 57 Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) member countries representing a GDP (current) in 2013 of $6.7 trillion are projected to grow 2015-19 at a higher rate (5.4%) than rest of the world (3.6%) or BRIC nations (3.9%.).
The top OIC sector clusters identified are: Energy, Food and Agriculture, Electronics, Travel and Transportation, Metals, Chemical and Allied, Plastics/Rubber, Textiles and related, Infrastructure and Construction, and Health Products and Services.
The Index is based on a set of nine metrics covering the categories of a country’s growth fundamentals, growth momentum, investment momentum and relative country risk.
Indonesia showed the strongest growth fundamentals among the top three having the highest population (249 million, 2013) and GDP ($870 billion, current US$, 2013), while Malaysia the strongest growth and investment momentum (217% FDI inflows growth 2009-13). GCC economies led by UAE are also on the top ten list including Qatar and Saudi Arabia. Other markets on the top 10 include Kazakhstan, Egypt, Turkey, Morocco, and Mozambique.
“The purpose of the Islamic Growth Markets Investment Report 2015 is to present a new view of looking at investment opportunities across the OIC member countries (57 member mostly Muslim majority.) Focused on fast growing consumer driven sector clusters of Food, Retail, Tourism, Health and others, as well as government spending driven infrastructure and construction, the Report addresses a gap of looking at investment opportunities across the full geographic spectrum of these growth markets and their global value chain,” Dr. Sayd Farook, the Global Head of Islamic Capital market at Thomson Reuters, said.
In order to leverage this widely dispersed yet connected opportunity landscape, the Report presents Dinar Standard’s OIC Industry Clusters Model that is a sector based investment strategy. It identifies unique region-wide roll-up, carve-out, growth, operation-value-creation and alliance opportunities across a sector’s value chain. The top OIC sector clusters identified are: Energy, Food and Agriculture, Electronics, Travel and Transportation, Metals, Chemical and Allied, Plastics/Rubber, Textiles and related, Infrastructure and Construction, and Health Products and Services. The opportunities cover green-field project investments as well in fast maturing domestic companies across these sectors.
“A rich mix of corporates from Islamic growth markets are fast maturing and ripe for growth investments. Tasnee and SABIC are chemical global leaders fast growing in energy downstream sectors; Yildiz Holding/Ulker, Savola Group, Indofood, Felda, Almarai are globally competitive food and agriculture companies; Emirates Group, Turkish Airlines, Qatar Airways and Saudi Arabian Airlines are major growth airlines; and Emke Group – Lulu, BIM, Majid Al Futtaim are emerging as regional retail giants. Thousands of such companies are ready to take their experiences propositions global,” Rafi-uddin Shikoh, DinarStandard, added.
“Energy is the largest OIC sector cluster by virtue of aggregate score derived from exports volume, imports and domestic consumption across OIC markets. Energy sector cluster exports were the highest within OIC worth $1.3 trillion in 2013 representing 43% of global exports. Exports grew 109% from 2009 to 2013. Primary opportunity areas identified: Renewable sector EPC (Engineering, Procurement and Construction) Services & O&M (Operation and Maintenance companies); Solar/ Wind farm; Bio-energy innovative solutions; Energy storage solutions.