EXPERT ANALYSIS
WAIPA
A better balance
Carlos Bronzatto, executive director of the World Association of Investment Promotion Agencies, explains why global dealflows have reached a juncture
Bronzatto, spoke with IFLR about how IPAs around the world are help- ing foreign entities navigate local regimes, fostering more accurate un- derstandings of local risks, and encouraging a healthier global investment environment.
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What are the key roles performed by IPAs, and how can investors and their advisers best avail themselves of these services? You could say that there are four core functions performed by IPAs: facilitation of inward investment; country image and nation branding; advocacy and policy reform; and, perhaps the most core function together with facilitation, is investment promotion per se. In this sense, investment promotion means proactively seeking out the industries and activities abroad that match what the IPA’s country has to offer, and also match the country’s aspirations in terms of internal policy.
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You increasingly see middle-income countries demonstrate very sophisticated ways of tackling IPAs’ four key functions
IFLR REPORT | FOREIGN DIRECT INVESTMENT 2014
nvestment promotion agencies (IPAs) play a vital role in attracting and supporting inbound investment. Executive director of the World Association of Investment Promotion Agencies (Waipa), Carlos
These four core functions also determine the activities of Waipa to
support its membership worldwide. There are, for example, some IPAs that engage in policy reform and nation branding to only a limited extent. Most IPAs, however, engage in investment promotion in targeted ways, and all of them facilitate investment.
Regarding how investors can avail themselves of an IPA’s services, they
can seek out the Agency’s assistance to facilitate their establishment in that country. It’s notable that IPAs provide pre-establishment and post- establishment facilitation, the latter often being referred to as after-care.
They also hold all sorts of information on different industries and
national players, and what sorts of licences are needed for different investments. They can help guide investors through the red tape, and sometimes they can expedite certain investment processes. All in all, many are a type of one-stop-shop for foreign investors, although some of them obviously do that better than others.
In your view, which IPAs have set the benchmark for best practice in attracting and supporting inbound foreign investment? I’d say those that have proactively sought to be more thoroughly informed of worldwide industry trends and firm-specific events held abroad, and followed the corporations they feel they must attract investment from. Also, those that have efficiently gathered information, based on which they have proactively reached out to prospective foreign investors. These IPAs tend to be the ones that are more successful.
I think the facilitation work should be a given as it is more responsive,
but this proactive approach via investment promotion is not as common. That’s not to say that it is not important to respond efficiently as well, but it also important to monitor events, business trends and corporations and then reach out in very targeted ways.
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