Today, Monday 15 May, Italian Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Antonio Tajani, will be in the Netherlands, in Rotterdam, to participate together with Dutch Minister of Foreign Affairs Wopke Hoekstra at the Italy-Netherlands Business Forum and at the Vanvitelli Strategic Round Table.
This mission to the Netherlands is one more step towards growth diplomacy, an inclusive process – promoted within the Italian Government by Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Antonio Tajani – open to a choral participation of the business world. Today’s event in Rotterdam will feature, for the first time in a large European country, large and small enterprises, together with the main trade associations from all sectors.
After a visit to the port of Rotterdam, leading port in Europe and one of the most important commercial ports in the world, Ministers Tajani and Hoekstra will speak at the Italy-Netherlands Business Forum, organised by the Italian Embassy in The Hague in cooperation with the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
The Forum will allow representatives of the private sectors of the two countries to discuss opportunities and collaborations between Italian and Dutch companies in the energy and environment, aerospace, biomedical innovation and semiconductors sectors.
The aim of the Business Forum is to further increase the economic-commercial flows between the two countries. The Netherlands is Italy’s 1st foreign investor, 6th largest trading partner in the world and 7th largest market for Italian exports, with a record trade volume of over EUR 55 billion, growing by an additional 27.5% in 2022. Italy is the seventh largest Dutch partner, after Germany, Belgium, France, the USA, the UK and Norway.
Italy’s main exports include: pharmaceuticals, machinery, food products. The main imports are: computers and electronic equipment, chemical products, food products, beverages and tobacco.
Many Italian companies are present in the Netherlands. They are particularly active in the pharmaceutical, manufacturing and food sectors, and their contribution to the local productive fabric is very significant, with EUR 5.7 billion in turnover. Rome and The Hague are looking with interest at new opportunities for collaboration in the most innovative and high-tech sectors.
Tajani and Hoekstra will also take part in the third edition of the “Vanvitelli Table”, a long-standing event that brings together representatives of the institutions, think tanks and universities of the two countries. The topics at the centre of the meeting will be strategic autonomy, energy security, and cooperation in the fight against transnational trafficking.
The two ministers will also hold a bilateral meeting to strengthen the excellent bilateral relations between Rome and The Hague as well as their political agreement on the main international crisis scenarios and the most important topics on the European agenda.
