UK opens doors to foreign capital

LONDON — The United Kingdom is “massively” open for foreign investments with well-established legal framework, making the country a favored investment destination, according to the UK Trade and Investment.

UKTI Chief Executive Nick Baird said the economic crisis in 2008 and 2009 was an important part of the process that made the government realize the need for change to be a better trading nation again.

On inward investments to UK, Baird said the business sector announced that UK is developing a new industrial strategy to focus on a specific sector to strengthen both in terms of domestic and international.

“This is immensely open economy in terms of inward investments. Britain is a country open to foreign investments and easy to set up business here with a well-regulated environment,” Baird said in an interview with Southeast Asian journalists.

Baird said major infrastructure projects are being developed in UK where 40 percent are foreign-owned.

In attracting investments, Baird said British investors would like to see open and transparent markets, low tariff levels, and regulation and legislation easy to understand and applied uniformly for countries less known to them.

He said awareness of opportunities should clearly exist for British investors and turn the interest and the initial knowledge into deeper interest and knowledge that can be translated to investments in the country and more substantial business relations.

“First of all is the opportunity and they clearly exist in sectors, so many different areas to promote the opportunities with major British companies that they should know about,” Baird said.

“Secondly, open and transparent market where tariff levels are low, where it is not difficult to establish a new business and where the local regulation and legislation is easy to understand and applied uniformly, efficiently and effectively,” he said.

He noted that British investors look at regulation and legislation and enforcement in every country, noting that good system of rules and corruption are issues that need to be addressed in any country to increase investors’ confidence and make investment environment attractive.

“So it’s more difficult for British companies here even if the legislation is quite difficult and high but if you don’t really understand the legislation you don’t know how it’s going to be enforced that’s even more difficult to realize clarity around legislation and regulation,” he added.

UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office Minister of State Jeremy Browne said during a visit to Manila last December that the Philippines is less known to British investors than some other nations in Asia.

He said the Philippines faces the task of encouraging investors and providing an understanding of the opportunities in the country.

Browne said there are British companies interested in the Philippines’ Public Private Partnership (PPP) projects but the task is to increase the understanding about the project,  what is realistic, how businesses can invest, outcomes and returns of investment.

One of key priorities for the Philippines, he said, is to make sure British businesses are aware of the opportunities that exist in the country.