The U.S. Ambssador in Mozambique, Dean Pittman had on October 25, 2016 a courtesy meeting with the Board of Directors of the Confederação das Associações Económicas de Moçambique (CTA) and visited their office. The United States Ambassador to Mozambique Dean Pittman’s visit to CTA facilities was a courtesy visit within the framework of the cooperation relations between the CTA and the US through its Agency for International Development – USAID.
In what was his first visit to the CTA as Ambassador, Dean Pittman said that the private sector is essential for the economic development of any country, so “we want to continue to support the Mozambican private sector.” “We want to continue working with CTA and together we will brainstorm how to strengthen the private sector to ensure the country has a good business environment,” said Dean Pittman.
The sectors of agriculture, tourism and natural resources deserved more attention in the meeting. The Ambassador expressed concern about the political instability in the country, as he said, no country develops without peace. “Without peace, the economy does not advance,” he said.
CTA President Rogério Manuel welcomed the initiative of the US Ambassador in approaching the CTA to closely meet the real challenges of the Mozambican private sector. CTA also spoke about its role in promoting public-private dialogue during the past 20 years.
“CTA is an institution that for many years, since its inception, has been operated by USAID, a US institution, which has been supporting it in order to bring a good business environment in Mozambique. Everything that concerns the good business environment was thought here in this house and we continue to have challenges, “said Rogério Manuel, stressing:” We explain what the CTA is doing, our thinking about the development of the country’s economy, and the difficulties. We talk about some of the structuring sectors of our country, especially agriculture and natural resources, where the US has a lot of experience and we want to learn from them.” The CTA President also expressed concern about the lack of peace in the country.
The current CTA Board of Directors is currently chaired by the transport and agriculture businessman Rogério Manuel and includes four other members: Agostinho Vuma (from the construction sector and also Member of Parliament from FRELIMO), Rogério Samo Gudo (from the services sector), Rui Monteiro (from the tourism sector), and Prakash Prehlad (from the commercial sector) – Prehlad is based in Beira, beside that CTA has Executive Director, which name is Luís Sitoe.
The mandate of this Board ends in March 2017 and elections for the new Board will be held during the next General Assembly, also scheduled for March.
