D-8 Chambers of Commerce and Industry hosted the first Virtual Conference to discuss the impacts of COVID-19 on the business community

D-8 Chambers of Commerce and Industry (D-8 CCI) and Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey (TOBB), as the current chair of the D-8 CCI, organized a first virtual conference with the support of the D-8 Secretariat on 17 June 2020.

The Secretary General of the D-8 Organization for Economic Cooperation, Ambassador Dato’ Ku Jaafar Ku Shaari in his opening remarks urged the Member States to work hard in order to strengthen solidarity and cooperation among Member States and help them to identify constraints and bottlenecks in tackling the COVID-19 pandemic as well as supporting them to build post-pandemic resilient health and economic systems.

The President of TOBB and D-8 Chambers of Commerce and Industry (D-8 CCI), Mr. M. Rifat Hisarcıklıoğlu also addressed the august gathering of the D-8 business community and stress the need to solidify the existing cooperation at this critical time when the world is facing unprecedented health and socio-economic crises.

The Federation of Bangladesh Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FBCCI), Federation of Egyptian Chambers of Commerce (FEDCOC), Indonesian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (KADIN), National Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Malaysia (NCCIM), Nigerian Association of Chambers of Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture (NACCIMA), Federation of Pakistan Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FPCCI) and the Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey (TOBB) participated in the virtual conference at the highest levels.

The participants exchanged views on the current state of affairs and measures taken by the Governments of D-8 Member States to prevent undesirable consequences of COVID-19 pandemic on their economies and shared the best practices of their respective Governments to support the business community in order to tackle the negative impacts of the global socio economic and health crises.

The participants also praised the actions taken by the Secretariat and lend their full support to the initiatives introduced by the D-8 Secretariat and the Governments of the D-8 Member States. The D-8 business community also appreciated the role of the D-8 Health and Social protection programme office in tackling and rapid response to COVID-19.

The participants also discussed the upcoming D-8 CCI activities and agreed to meet virtually at regular interval and will review the progress made on the decisions taken at the first webinar. Similarly, they expressed support for idea of convening D-8 CCI business forum as a side-line event of the 10th D-8 Summit.