November 10, 2007. With a view to promote Seychelles offshore business, the Seychelles International Business Authority (SIBA) has recently sponsored two important events in offshore community - Asia Offshore Association Conference and International Tax Planning Association meeting.
Asia Offshore Association (AOA) Conference was held on October 31 - November 2, 2007 in Saigon, Vietnam, and it offered presentations by leading practitioners in the banking, law, accounting and realty industries in Vietnam.
International Tax Planning Association (ITPA) meeting was held in Hong Kong held on November 4-6, 2007 and represented itself an excellent platform for offshore product networking and marketing.
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October 1, 2007. On September 19, 2007, there was the official opening ceremony of the Embassy of the Republic of Seychelles in Beijing, People's Republic of China. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Seychelles announced the opening in the beginning of September.
The official opening ceremony was attended by Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Seychelles, Mr. Patrick Pillay and other high government officials. Also,business people from China attended the opening ceremony of the Embassy.
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September 9, 2007. Barclays Bank indicated the Seychelles as a country with good money laundering control in offshore banks.
Barclays Bank has been recently given the license to operate as an offshore bank in Ghana. At a workshop on offshore banking, Ms. Catherine Addo of Barclays Bank said that Seychelles is an example of good offshore banking and added that the strict control measures used for offshore banking branches in Seychelles (including the usage of the World Checking System to double check clients' background) would be applied also in Ghana. These measures.
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August 28, 2007. Seychelles has re-entered the Southern African Development Community (SADC).
The jurisdiction had already been the member of the organization. It joined the SADC, quit it, then decided to rejoin it. It should always be taken into account that Seychelles is very different from most member states of SADC. It differs from them both geographically and economically. Still, the jurisdiction decided that re-entering the SADC will be beneficial for it this time.
A budget of USD 1.9 million was allocated by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to prepare for Seychelles re-entry into SADC. Finally, tit has been readmitted.
All in all, SADC has 15 members now.
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August 18, 2007. In 2006, a 13.71% rise was recorded by the Seychelles Credit Union (SCU) on its general reserve.
Capital available for immediate disbursement to clients (in other words, liquidity) has risen by 137%, which is a 3-fold increase over the 2005 results. Income collected by the SCU has substantially fallen during 2006. Still, the Seychelles Credit Union has recorded an increase of 7.18 % in surplus for 2006 as far as the SCU lowered its expenses, accumulating the net benefit.
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August 2, 2007. According to Seychelles President James Michel's expectations, the Seychelles' economy is to grow by 7.5% in 2007 as far as investment in the jurisdiction's keeps on increasing.
Recently, President Michel was reflecting on his 1st year in office since he was elected in 2006. He noted that Seychelles has been able to progress and said that the level of growth has reached 5.3%. The President suggested that such growth reflecting an increase of 1.2% from the previous year is a definite progress since restarting the economy of Seychelles. It should be noted that the growth of 7.5% is expected this year - this prediction is based on the available data.
According to Michel, in 2007, about USD 100 million in foreign exchange has flowed into the country. The reserves of Seychelles at the end of June were USD 110 million showing a 16% increase as compared with 2006. The President expects reserves to keep on on growing as the economy of the Seychelles grows.
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June 9, 2007. In the beginning of June, Russia's Federal Tax Service (FTS) has announced that Russia should sign agreements on exchange tax information with the Seychelles and other offshore countries.
Deputy head of Russia's FTS, Konstantin Sedov, said that tax agreements are to be signed in order to exchange tax information with the Seychelles, the British Virgin Islands, Gibraltar as well as with other offshore jurisdictions.
The above-mentioned proposal was sent by Russia's Federal Tax Service to the Russian Finance Ministry. The Ministry will consider holding the necessary talks with the corresponding agencies of the Seychellois government and other of foreign governments.
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May 20, 2007. May 23, Barclays Bank will open a new retail branch of Barclays Bank (Seychelles) at the Providence Industrial Zone.
Providence Industrial Zone was chosen by the Bank as far as over the years it has seen an increased level of business activity, and Barclays Bank believes this trend to continue in future.
The branch located in the P&J building complex will offer all the normal branch services including ATM services, loan processing and cashiering transactions.
According to a bank's representative, the opening of a new branch is part of the Barclays Bank's strategy of expanding retail footprint across the different groups of population aimed to bring services closer to the public.
With the new branch, bank's customers will be able to choose the closest branch and shift their banking to wherever is convenient for them, which is an instant benefit for many people.
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May 5, 2007. It was announced on May 1 that Emirates Hotels & Resorts has decided to support Seychelles resort - it is investing $253 million in a project in this country.
The Emirates Cap Ternay Resort & Spa will be located on Mahe island and consist of a main resort with 186 rooms and 230 semi-detached complexes and a private resort with 15 water bungalows, 40 2-bedroom villas and a presidential suite. A Timeless Spa will also be available there.
It is planned to open the resort in 2010.
It is worth noting that Emirates is also considering other locations for similar hotel resorts - the countries under consideration are India, Sri Lanka and east Africa to build. So, the company intends to expand its network of destinations from Sydney to New York.
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April 15, 2007. The Seychelles and Kenya have signed a new bilateral agreement to provide for increasing trade between their capitals Victoria and Nairobi.
Victoria mayor Mrs Florence Benstrong and Nairobi mayor Dick Wathika have signed a pact and agreed that despite the near location of the 2 capitals, trade between Victoria and Nairobi is limited.
Both mayors have expressed their expectations that the signing of this bilateral pact will change and improve the current situation in trade, which is minimal but, nevertheless, many locals of Seychelles have links with locals in Kenya and fly there regularly. Therefore, Nairobi mayor expects that the agreement will help to develop infrastructure links in order to promote tourism between Seychelles and Kenya.
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March 30, 2007. According to the National Statistics Bureau (NSB), the Seychelles' tourism industry has showed a good start, which was marked by an increase in visitor arrivals of 15% during January, February and March of 2007.
By March 25, 38 200 people visited the Seychelles, which was 26% more than the average in the last 5 years for the same period.
The leading source of tourists visiting the Seychelles was France, followed by Italy and Germany. The tourists from UK, Ireland and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) follow Italians and Germans.
Tourist markets of France, Italy, UK, Ireland and the CIS have showed increases in tourist arrivals of between 13% and 42%.
It is worth noting that in 2006 tourism contributed 57% of foreign revenue of the Seychelles.
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March 3, 2007. The Embassy of Seychelles in the capital of Italy, Rome, was opened in the end of February. The establishment of the Embassy is aimed at reinforcing the diplomatic relationship between the Seychelles and Italy.
At the opening ceremony of the Embassy of Seychelles in Rome, Seychellois President James Alix Michel regarded the opening as a moment of pride for the Seychelles as well as important historical event.
According to President Michel, the new embassy is broadening the outlook of the country and maintaining its position in the international arena.
The contact details are:
Embassy of the Republic of Seychelles
Via Rivarone n.66 - 00166
Roma, Italy
Tel.(+39 06)66 510 207
Fax (+39 06)66 514 293
Ambassador - Mr. Graziano Triboldi
1st Secretary of the Embassy - Miss Geraldine Saurer
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February 14, 2007. The Head of State of China has made his first visit to the Seychelles since the establishment of diplomatic relations between the countries in July 1976. As a result of official talks during the visit, Chinese President Hu Jintao and Seychellois President James Michel decided on developing the already existing ties between the countries. For example, they agreed to promote pragmatic co-operation in tourism, human resources, fishery and other areas.
One of the general purposes of Hu Jintao during this visit was to implement the China's commitments made during the Beijing summit of the Forum of China-Africa Cooperation in November 2006.
The President of China proposed to develop partnership between the countries and to increase exchanges between legislative, governmental and non-governmental departments, in order to enhance mutual understanding and trust. He also confirmed that China will continue with providing economic assistance to Seychelles.
By words of Hu Jintao, the Chinese government promotes economic ties by encouraging the country's enterprises to import more goods from Seychelles and to invest more in its infrastructure, telecommunications, etc.
China and Seychelles have signed 5 bilateral co-operation agreements during this visit, concerning economic and technological co-operation, investment promotion and education.
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February 5, 2007. Members of the National Economic Planning Council met under the chairmanship of President James Michel organized meeting to look for ways to remove obstacles that trouble the increasing economic growth of the Seychelles. Council's opinion is that the economy of the country is set to continue growing rapidly.
The meeting was the 1st in 2007 and the 3rd on the NEPC calendar, which starts in September and has eight meetings annually. It included 3 presentations. The 1st presentation was made by the Public Utilities Corporation, responding to issues raised at the last NEPC meeting, which concerned the analysis of future electricity supply capacity. The 2nd presentation was made by Vivianne Fock-Tave, the principal secretary for International Relations, and regarded the economic partnership agreements with the European Union. According to the Council's secretary, there is a new system negotiated with the EU. The 3rd presentation on the strategy was presented by President Michel, and discussed the future of the Seychelles in the next years.
According to the Council's secretary, Caroline Abel, the most rapidly growing sectors of the Seychelles economy were fisheries and tourism. The Council also discussed Internet connectivity and financial services. During the last 30 years the economy of Seychelles has grown in a particular direction. Now the Seychelles government is looking at the new sources of growth.
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January 24, 2007. In 2006 the Seychelles welcomed record number of tourists - 140 627. The country is planning to increase the number, but not to make it more than 200 000 visitors by 2010, to safeguard an environment and avoid the risk of environmental degradation. Joseph Belmont, vice-president of the Seychelles and the Minister for Tourism, is especially worried about too large figures on the islands with exclusive beaches.
The Seychelles is traditionally welcoming more tourists than its population, which makes 82 000 people. In 2002 the country welcomed 132 246, then, after a slight decline in visitors' number, the figures increased again starting from 2005.
Maurice Loustau-Lalanne, chief executive officer of the Seychelles Tourism Board, expressed the pleasure to receive such result of growth in visitor arrivals. He also expressed his expectations suggesting more visits in 2007.
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