 Welcome to our panel on how strategic infrastructure investments can promote growth and investment. My name is Murat Sanmez. I'm a member of the managing board of the World Economic Forum, and it's my privilege to be on the stage with our distinguished panelists. Gordon Brown, who is the chair of the World Economic Forum Global Strategic Infrastructure Initiative, United Nations Special Envoy for Global Education, and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 2007 and 2010, and I had to stop here. He has done a lot more, but this is a summary of the recent roles Gordon has taken on. Majid Jafar, chief executive officer of Crescent Petroleum, United Arab Emirates. Dr. Hanim Mloki, chief commissioner of the Akhaba Special Economic Zone Authority, has been very active with the Jordanian government, including being the foreign minister of Jordan. John Rice, vice chairman of GE, and Thierry Del, chief executive officer of Meridian Infrastructure. So welcome to our panel, and thank you for being here. So I'd like to set the stage on the case for infrastructure investments. It represents a big opportunity for economic growth, tackle the unemployment issue, yet serious challenges and obstacles remain, from financing to political and regulatory risks and transparency. So I'd like to start with you, Gordon Brown, if we may. We just wrapped up the regional business council meeting, which may have reminded you of the House of Commons setting. When you walked in, it was a bit more civilized, I think, from what we saw on TV debates. Can you set the global context for infrastructure investments? And the oil price is at $60, and you said there has never been a better time. First of all, can I say what a pleasure it is to be in Jordan and to see the progress that is being made in infrastructure, particularly by the King's announcements at the forum yesterday, and to be speaking to this business community, because I want to acknowledge as someone who has been involved in the region for many years the crucial role of business, not simply in bringing prosperity to this region, but in advancing the cause of peace. And I want to thank you all for what you do. Now you may wonder why it's a politician on this stage talking as the first speaker on infrastructure. I suppose I'm a recovering politician. It's said of politicians that they promise to build bridges even when there is no water to cross. And you know that many plans exist in the minds of politicians that don't come to fruition because they're not thought through, because there is no proper planning to them, and because the capacity is not there to implement. The reason I say that this is a huge opportunity now for infrastructure in this region is not just the need, high levels of youth unemployment, high degree of need for particular facilities, whether it's water, power, schools and hospitals, is because interest rates have been low, there is a surplus of savings, and even when we have the barriers to infrastructure finance, which is public finances are in a difficult position in many countries, the oil price is low, the banks have been put in a more difficult position to be lenders because of Baal III, I do believe that the need and the low interest rate and the surplus of savings makes it possible for us to make huge progress in infrastructure. So what are the barriers? The barriers are in not recognizing that the most positive way forward is more effective partnerships between the public and private sector. And the World Economic Forum is uniquely positioned to try to bring people together, public and private sectors, to identify the possibilities, to look at the obstacles and to see if we can provide solutions. The reason I'm speaking today is I'm chairing the initiative which is looking worldwide at what we can do to move these things forward. First of all, there is a large number of project preparation facilities, and we must make it possible for the early stages of infrastructure projects to be properly financed when the risk is greatest and when the returns are lowest. Secondly, there are huge advances now in looking at how we can support credit facilities that will mitigate the risk for business investors in infrastructure. And there are new plans that have come out of Davos and are coming forward in a number of just regional initiatives that mitigate risk, whether they're construction risk, currency risk, political risk, regulatory risk, and looking scientifically at how we can do this. And the third thing is there are first loss and second loss facilities being examined, and the EBRD and Thomas Meyer is here today are putting forward a proposal to the whole international community that we do something to mitigate risk in this particular sense. So there is huge amount of new thinking in this area. There is no region with only 5% of your GDP spent on infrastructure that is more relevant to the development of these ideas than this one. And I believe that we can make progress only by the public and private sector developing the capacity together to move the need for infrastructure forward. That's power, that's energy, that's transport, road and rail, that's schools and hospitals, and that is the basis on creating a more civilized, more productive, more fair society and one where we can advance the cause not just of prosperity but of peace and stability. Thank you. Thank you, Gordon. I'm 55% and if I'm not mistaken, China spends 15% for GDP on infrastructure, so there's a lot of room for growth in this area. I'd like to turn to you, honey, Mouki. You've been very active both on the technical and political sides of infrastructure investment. Can you talk about the regional context and what we can do to reduce the political risks and increase transparency? Thank you very much, Murad. We are looking for strategic infrastructure projects. One has to look at projects in the region that transcend beyond local boundaries of countries such as water pipelines, oil pipelines, gas pipelines, national grids and regional grids, electricity grids, renewable power generation plants. All this will create, number one, an interdependent region. That should reduce risk starting. Number two, it would provide a place where disparities in income are minimized. Number three, it would combat terrorism, extremism, and at the same time would provide for transparency. Now, why isn't this happening? I feel that the major problem is the private sector is shying away from coming into major, long-term infrastructure projects. The reason is the political risk, regulatory risks, and the absence of transparency. If one looks at how can we get over these, if we know that the only investor today in the region or the main investor in the region is the public sector, and that's how much he can do, and that's how much cooperation he can provide. So one, the public sector cannot do it alone. The private sector is shying away because it's long-term and the risk goes higher at an exponential. And the banks, if we look at Basel III, the banks are limiting long-term loans. We think, first of all, we have to address investment institutions, such as insurance companies, funds, sovereign wealth funds, and ask them to come and partner with the public sector on these projects. But that's not alone. That could provide transparency. But I don't think it will provide risk guarantees. In order for us to provide risk guarantees, I think we have to go to international financial institution and have them, the three together work together. One is providing the governance of the projects and the programs. One is managing the programs, and one is providing the financial support that is needed. Having said that, we're not saying that just because we think it's right. I think in Acaba, we did that. We have established a company for development, and that company started making partnerships with the private sector in terms of implementation and managing, and with the international financial organizations and institutes in financing. We have completed some of the major harbors. We are witnessing in the next two days an example of that with a renewable energy project, photovoltaic of 10 megawatt, where that tri-lateral or tri-party participation is there. We are looking for a railway to be financed and operated in the same manner I mentioned. I think this is the way that we can create in Acaba projects that are viable, transparent and risk-free, and in the region by having this interdependent, we can reduce almost all the risks that are available, that are there for long-term investments that infrastructure requires. Thank you, honey. In our regional business council meeting, our Chair Omar Alganim mentioned that it takes a container nine days to go from Kuwait to Qatar, and it takes one day from Frankfurt to Nice, which is the same distance, because of different regulatory frameworks that at the crossing points, the container has to be stopped. And if we can create this within the region common framework, it not only reduces the risk and creates interdependency, but it also facilitates, increases the productivity of doing business. Majid, if we can pivot to you. If you've been very active in this field, both locally and also regionally, and you propose a Marshall Plan, and you have been the architect of the Arab stabilization plan, if you can give us your perspective from the regional viewpoint, please. Sure, thank you very much. It's great to be here. From a business perspective, as the Crescent Group were a family business group, 45 years old, now headquartered in the UAE, and focused on the infrastructure space in countries like Iraq and Egypt as well. In each of those countries over the last seven years, we've invested over $2 billion in the infrastructure space from the extractive industries, processing pipelines, power station construction into port management and logistics. Looking at our region overall, first of all, I think we need to ask ourselves why this is important. And we heard the deficit, and we were spending 5% of GDP compared to 15% in China and about 10% on average in most of the rest of the world, developing world, certainly. And why is that important? That's important because, in my view, that's why China hasn't had another Tiananmen Square, and that's why we're going to keep having Tehrir Squares. And the Youth Unemployment Challenge, which is the number one risk as defined for our region, is caused partly by rigid labor markets and education systems that are out of date, which are being well-addressed in other sessions at the summit, but first and foremost caused by inadequate growth and inadequate investment. And traditionally, the economic models in countries, many countries in this region, have been socialist state-centric models, and government expenditure has been completely eaten up historically in countries like Egypt on recurrent expenditure, salaries, public sector salaries, subsidies, energy subsidies alone, eat up $2 to $300 billion a year in this region, more than half the energy subsidies in the world, which is really a lost opportunity, and debt servicing, leaving very little left for investment. And as was mentioned, the government has been relied upon traditionally as the main source of investment, and that's starting to change now, and Jordan has led the way with public-private partnership legislation and implementation capacity in the government, but it's the exception that proves the rule, and we need to really expand that know-how across the region. We need to talk about, apart from the economic model, we can't ignore the politics. Conflicts rage in the region, and international trust, trust between governments in the region, I would say, is at the lowest level ever, and that is an obstacle to cross-border investments and the type of multilateral cooperation that we talked about and that we said we need, and we can't ignore that fact. The other challenges that we have in the region, the oil sector is distorted because it's a huge part of GDP and income, but it's a very low part of employment generation, and we have a concentration of capital. So there's a lot of capital in the governments, in the GCC states, but they're a minority of the population, and the major infrastructure investment requirements or the deficit in infrastructure spending is in other countries in the region. So how to unlock that and get it redirected to where it's needed? And the third challenge, of course, is the know-how. We don't have in the region, by and large, that level of know-how. It is available in Wests and Western institutions, but marrying the know-how from the international community to the capital in the West is, I think, the challenge, and the reasons that's become difficult. One is conflict, of course. Unfortunately, our region dominates for headlines of conflict and instability rather than investment opportunity, and the second is the sense that it's not a poor region. It actually is a poor region in most of the region, but the sense is there is capital in the region, so why should the rest of the world step up to help? So finding a way around that, creating the right structures that are going to unlock the capital within the region, and not just in governments. I think there's at least another $4 trillion in the private sector across the region, but capital is a coward, as Mr. Hani said, when you've got not just the conflict, but regulatory obstacles. It needs to be married somehow with the government funds and multilateral structures that will give confidence and unlock the capital. Thank you, and the issue of trust also came up in the Regional Business Council meeting, and one of the ministers highlighted the fact that as the private part, public partnerships are being launched, the people are asking, questioning, why are the governments selling the national assets? So establishing that trust is absolutely key. Thierry Dow, Chief Executive Officer of Meridian Infrastructure, you have been practicing this on a daily basis. You are at home everywhere around the world, is one of the ministers, Khorodiyaz. How do you structure the deals? What is the secret for success? What is the secret source? I'll try to see that in less than three minutes because I could talk about it for about a whole day, but I guess you will lose interest. But I would think of three pillars that are success factors of PPP and infrastructure investment in general. The first one being strategic leadership and project preparation coming from the public sector, and I can give you a few examples of good practice in that. The second one is a resilient administration that is capable of engaging over the long term with the private sector and discuss issues from environment, job creation, training around infrastructure investment, which is quite a key component of infrastructure successful and sustainable investment. And the last one I would say is the ability to create a project specific environment to foster long term lending for the specific project, long term lending and long term investment. On the first example, I'd like to take two very different example of countries. If I like to name Canada, for example, for being one of a leading country with providing real skills, talent, and resources for project preparation with the PPP Canada that has a budget of about a billion Canadian dollars a year, that's probably the worst price of all we would want to see everywhere. But another more modest but very efficient example is the South African government that has been able, with very little capital to put together a PPP unit to deal with its renewable energy program and has been one of the most successful in the past few years, a country in terms of delivering renewable energy for the country. So with very little you could do a lot, with a lot of money you can do also a lot, but clearly strategic guidance, project preparation is key to attract and to create success. The second point about the administration resilience, and I don't want to go too far into political risk, but at the end of the day, rating is one view of the risk in a country. What is important for investors in what makes project successful is the ability of an administration to engage and discuss issues with investors in the private sector on all level. I mean, job creation is one of the key factor and for that I'll take the example of what we've achieved in Turkey on their social program. We did have the focus and the strategy to want to develop a network of public hospitals, but we've also had the ability to engage closely with the Ministry of Health on issues like the environment when creating the first hospital in Adana next to the Syrian border, but also thinking how we could deal with the local companies, job creation, training, and even how health services would be developed around this hospital. These are good examples. That same example can serve in terms of showing how you can mobilize long-term capital if you have the proper framework and specific project framework. I mean, this project was possible very much because we teamed up with a number of multilateral agencies, EBRD being one, but IFC, but also MIGA being present and allowing a country like Turkey to really access 18-year long-term capital plus our capital, which is 25-year longer. And that support and those guarantees and that partnership was essential in really bringing that long-term capital, allowing people to really come, develop the project, and stay for the long-term. Thank you. Fascinating stories. Again, this government resilience was brought up in the RBC session. I think in 2011, the natural gas supply to Jordan from Egypt was cut off, basically, because of the political developments, but the country used the public-private partnership model and really recovered very quickly in a matter of a couple of years and now has more surplus and more reserves. So your point about government resilience and framework is absolutely on the spot. John, if we can switch to you, as GE have been underground in the region for 80 years, if you can share some of your experiences from the past, your plans, and also what can governments do to guarantee success or maximize the chances? Sure, thanks, Marat. It's great to be with you and to talk about this subject because it is, I think, so important in this world and we see examples of it everywhere we do business, which is about 170 countries, but this is our largest, fastest-growing growth region and we measure that a lot of different ways. So what happens here really matters to us, but a comment about the context, because we've been talking for the last couple of days about the implications of oil at $60 a barrel and the need for extra funding for security-related activities, all of which puts a tremendous amount of stress on the fiscal side of the equation and as Gordon pointed out, there's already a shortfall in infrastructure investment. The current environment's only gonna make it more difficult. Globally, it's about a trillion dollars of shortfall every year, so this point about how we facilitate financing and capital flows to get to infrastructure projects has never been more important or more pressing. Demand for infrastructure is great and the need for speed and accountability that governments are held to everywhere in the world. If they don't deliver, there are repercussions. People just aren't patient, they're not waiting. The demands are significant, so I have two thoughts about this that I'd like to share with the group. One is around how we define infrastructure. It is a broad term that covers a lot of things, but when you think about the development of an economy and delivering results for a population, you really have to start with some very basic things like electricity, like clean water, like healthcare. So one thought is to think about infrastructure in the context of Maslow's hierarchy of needs where we and public institutions and the global funding institutions maybe do different things for the infrastructure requirements that are at the bottom of the triangle. Because if you don't have electricity or good healthcare or clean water, you don't really care about anything else. So maybe the IMF and the World Bank could relax some of their requirements for good infrastructure projects that are focused at the bottom of the triangle. And the second point I'd make quickly is the need for clarity around what the government priorities are. Where we've seen that in this region, Saudi Arabia a few years ago, Vision 2020, a clear call for companies like ours to help diversify the economy, resulted in a series of investments that we committed to and some work on the ground that is a contribution toward those objectives. But a clear agenda, clear priority, not unlike the five-year plan that China is quite famous for. If you understand that five-year plan and you line up underneath it, you contribute. And I think we're operating in Egypt now on an emergency power project. The order was committed in December of last year. The units are coming online now. We've never done anything that fast. And it's because the single-minded focus of the president, the ability to get all of the ministries working together, that has allowed a level of speed and execution which we haven't seen. And I suspect the Egyptians haven't seen. It's a role model for the rest of the world, especially given the regional context. That's quite impressive. Before we turn to the audience for Q&A, I'd like to ask Honey one question. The oil prices around $60, the issue of subsidies come up. And it's an opportunity for all the important countries because it reduces the cost, but for exporting countries who, it's a matter of financial gap. And it's easy to say we can reduce the subsidies, but it has a lot of social implications and going back to basic Maslow hierarchy of needs. How do we tackle this dilemma of we know what needs to be done, but how do we do it in such a way that does not create further social unrest? Any thoughts on that? Well, actually, removing subsidy makes the product available for everybody because with subsidy, what happens is you abuse the product, whatever it is. And that would create more costs on the public sector in terms of providing new infrastructure. That would put more taxes. So are we looking at front-loading or back-loading? If you are having subsidy, that's what you're doing is front-loading. You're asking, you're giving the money to the people and you are allowing them to abuse that product. And at the end of the day, the society becomes poorer and poorer. So if we back-load and then we sell the product at its price, we are creating a consumer that would like not to abuse the product, he would save on the product and at the end of the day, he will pay less taxes. So the issue is, is the society willing to wait and gain the profits of development or not? This is something that has to come through education, through training, through being transparent in your programs and projects and showing that this will work. But if you remove subsidy and at the end of the day, two years later, you increase taxes, then nobody is going to trust you after that. So I think you have to, if you're going to subsidize, you subsidize in terms of improving productivity rather than reducing productivity. Okay, thank you. So again, goes back to Majid's point of trust and raising the awareness and preparing the public for something that may hurt them. I just wanted to add a point on the subsidies. I mean, if you take the solar industry, for example, I mean, subsidy has been something really spoiling it since a number of countries have abandoned subsidies. Technology has actually improved to make this technology a competitive source of energy which hasn't been the case in Europe, for example, for a long time because of the subsidies. But when you look at a number of countries in Africa, and I think it is possible, so here, you can actually produce energy at competitive level. So oil price going down may be also an opportunity with that subsidy issue to create more innovation about how we make it and how competitive we need to be. Just to John's point on definition, and I think it is important, I mean, what do we mean by infrastructure? So the World Bank in 2013 had an infrastructure report and it went deep dive on this region. And it estimated the deficit in spending is about $100 billion a year, approximately half in new investment and the other half, maintenance of existing infrastructure which sometimes gets forgotten. And 80% of that requirement was really power, John's own sector and transportation, the sort of middle income on the way up in the hierarchy of needs. And in terms of impact, so most of that spending, the current spending is going on in the GCC. But actually, if you look at the three types of countries in the region and impact, it estimated every billion dollars could create work for 26,000 people in the GCC, mixed between short and longer term jobs. But in the oil developing countries like Iraq, the figure is 49,000 jobs. In oil importing countries like Egypt and Jordan, that billion dollars could create 110,000 jobs. So it's different level of impact across the region. So what is the motivation? Well, one, it has to be stability. I mean, the Gulf States and the international community want to see stability in the region. It's a key theme of this summit, tackling extremism and its causes. And the other one is returns. I mean, interest rates are pitifully low today. Asset classes most are not as attractive as they were. And the World Bank report estimates that infrastructure investment across the world gives you returns of between 5% and 25%. All of which are better than most alternatives that are facing governments today. I think we're now getting a picture of the gains that could come to this region by focusing on infrastructure. The gap has just been said by Majid, $100 billion a year. Energy subsidies roughly $2 to $300 billion a year. So if you could divert some money at a time when oil costs are low from energy subsidies into infrastructure, you could make a huge difference to the quality of life in the region. But of course also, you've just been given figures about the employment impact of 100 billions of investment leading to tens of millions of jobs. And so not only do we have this need, but we have means by which we can deal with this need. But the important point I would want to emphasize before we go out to the group, the questions from the floor, is that how much more can be achieved if you can have effective public-private partnerships? That public money, which is under pressure, could go further. Private savings can be brought in. Returns can be high. So it is potentially a win-win situation for private investors for the public sector, but also for meeting the needs of the large number of young people in this region who are looking for opportunities for employment. And that's why I think this focus on infrastructure today is incredibly important for the long-term future of the region. Thank you, Gordon. With that, I'd like to turn to the audience for questions. If you can raise your hands, we'll get your mic. And if you can mention your name, your affiliation, and a short question. And if it is directed to any of the panel members, please specify that. Why don't we start in the first row on the left here? Yeah, my name is Dorayd Mahasnid from APC. And my question, actually, a remark to Mr. Jaffer. I fully agree with him. If we don't reach political reform in this region, and particularly in particular put the religion and the disputes and the religion aside, we would continue to kill each other. We do not realize that we're not throwing flowers on Daesh or in Yemen or in Libya. That is costy wars. And costy wars means less expenses and less money or less funds to do anything in infrastructure. Gradually, if that is not sustained, we wouldn't have any economical growth. Thank you. Thank you. Question close to you. Now we'll go to the lady behind you. Loyal Khate from Iraq Energy Institute. Iraq's supposed to increase, double its oil production by 2022, at least 7.5 million barrels. Quadruple its production on the gas and utilize and monetize it plus doubling the power electricity basically to at least 24 gigawatt. Now all this development requires significant investment in infrastructure, the very bottleneck that delaying achieving these targets. In addition to this, we have the challenge of attracting foreign direct investment. That's at least 1.2 trillion US dollars. Under current oil prices, loyal prices and the war on terrorism, what would be your recommendation to realize these targets by 2020 or beyond? Thanks. John, do you want to take this on? And then we'll go to other problems. Well, there's two areas that I would concentrate on, among others. One is willingness to give sovereign guarantees. Without those, I don't see the foreign capital being available to fund anything close to what's required. And I think you summarized it very accurately. The other thing notwithstanding the challenges that exist in Iraq today is some way for the government to come together so that there is a cohesive voice about what the priorities are. It's a complicated place to do business and we're very active there. We have several hundred employees. We've been in Iraq, we've gone the distance in Iraq and we're not going anywhere. But there's a lot of friction in the government processes, getting approvals, getting permits and I know that doesn't sound like a grandiose solution but it's critically important when you're trying to move an infrastructure project forward and if you're an investor and you have choices and most of the investors we're talking about do, you're just gonna go someplace else where it's easier. So there has to be a real effort to simplify and modernize the way the government bureaucracy works. Thank you. Terry, do you want to comment on the question? No, no. Okay, all right. Lady behind you. I'm Reem, global shaper. Infrastructure development investment in the region and particularly in poor and fragile countries are usually reliant on grant schemes or loans from the World Bank and such organizations. Sometimes indirectly or directly this support is associated with political agendas. Right now we're seeing new players coming on board like China's Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank. We see some countries in the region joining this bank so how would this impact the region and what would the role of Western countries be like in the short to long-term? Majid. Excellent point. It was actually the next one I was going to make so you made it for me. So I think we do need to look at some of what's really going on in the ground. First of all, new institutions like the one you just mentioned, $50 billion committed. Many Western countries actually joining including the UK in Germany and Italy. It was the U.S. which criticized it and actually the U.S. government got a lot of criticism from former U.S. ministers and academics for criticizing it because and it looks so far like they're going for a world standard. I mean there was some criticism of China's investments in Africa on human rights, on using Chinese companies and Chinese labor but for this body so far what I've been hearing they're getting, they're actually poaching people from the World Bank, the legal advisor, the human rights advisor, people from the U.S. foreign service, they're trying to create a world institution and governments in the region including UAE, Qatar, Oman and others have joined and they're now talking to Egypt and others in the region. So I think we do need to look at different institutions whether there have been those who have called for one from the Arab world. Now our track record in the Arab world of inter-Arab institutions is not great. I don't think we have time to build another one but maybe we can create an Arab fund and partner with AIIB or others like the EBRD to have that impact. The other thing I would say is different local funding models. So just give one example, the Egyptian Second Suez Canal, despite the conflict, despite all the political transitions, they raised $8 billion in three days and it was more than half of it was like crowdfunding from Egyptians which shows you actually how much money there is not just in private companies but under people's mattresses in the region if the right projects can be identified. So we don't just need to look at external money or government money, there are innovative approaches now that can work in our region itself. Gordon Brown? Yeah, I don't think there's any substitute for governments in the region having their own plans that are carefully thought out, developing the capacity within the government to deliver public-private partnerships and leadership from the top, but the leading people in the country pushing the infrastructure projects and without these things are not gonna happen but what's been said is absolutely right. There is an availability of finance around the world from some of the new initiatives, there's gonna be a brick bank soon, we've got the World Bank developing a new infrastructure facility of its own, we've got the regional development banks, the EBRD in the region with resources to put into this and we've got the new Asian Investment Facility which is a lending facility, it's not an equity taker, it's a lending facility but that's very substantial funds that are gonna be available. In the end too, however, the sovereign guarantees are probably more important than the money that is provided by these public agencies and I think it's important to recognize that the balance of activity between public and private sector is gonna change. Public sector guarantees may be more important than public sector money in the longer run and we've gotta look at how we can mitigate the risks in such a way that these guarantees can be given. The EBRD is of course very active in the region and maybe Thomas Ma might want to say something about his proposal for a first and second risk facility that would make private investment a far more attractive option for companies that are considering it. Thomas. Thank you very much. Before I turn to that, I think it's important for all of us to understand that for example AIIB, we see this as a huge opportunity for us because AIIB will be a risk-taking project finance bank and we need more of those players. Secondly, I think in the last few years, the landscape of IFI cooperation has really changed and we now work together in a very regular and very effective way through GIF, through the Global Infrastructure Hub that will be established in Sydney within the context of G20 and so on and so forth. And I think when we look at the IFI's role in promoting infrastructure, we need to ask ourselves what are the enablers for private investment in public infrastructure? They are a government that has a long-term vision and the capacity to deliver, which means know-how, vision and stability. And we also do need to create a credible pipeline of projects so that the private sector sees it as attractive to move into a market and that's where IFI's work together. And an additional element of where IFI's are increasingly active is to crowd in institutional investors because I think bank funding is available for projects as soon as they are bankable. And we see this in Turkey, where now in the social hospital program, this 18 billion dollar program is now largely funded by private banks and what we try to do with our proposal for risk mitigation facility is to crowd institutional investors into this space because we see that in countries where there is a credible pipeline and a good delivery like in Turkey and in Jordania, we need institutional investors to come in. And that's the additional role I think we as IFI's, whether it's the World Bank, MIGA, IFC, EIV and so on can play and this is what we want to play. Thank you. Thank you, Thomas. Can I add just to finish on what Thomas was saying because we're currently trying to create the first project bond in Turkey to actually attract institutional investors. But what we shouldn't forget is that there's a lot of capital present in this region. It's probably one of the richest in capital and this capital also needs to commit to its own region to give comfort to capital from outside because it's very difficult for European investors to understand that they sit next to sovereign wealth funds from this region to buy utilities in the UK, in Germany and that when they come over here, they don't really see those same people. So there's a bit of an appeal to be made to sovereign wealth funds and institution in this region to actually commit to their own people. Thank you, honey, a brief comment before we go on to the next question. First of all, we have to say that we need the political will for the partnership before we can talk about anything. We need to not only prioritize, but we do not wait to finish Daesh or other than Daesh, we have to go to work. Number three, when we talk about sovereign guarantees, how are we going to get sovereign guarantees from non-sovereign countries? We have to look at the regional solution where it is cross boundary guarantees because what is going to be good for the whole region is what happens in every individual country. So actually now today, if we are going to be locked in for governments that are participating in a regional plan for the region, locked into seeing how we can get money from banks when banks are not giving money, I agree. We have to go to investment institutions. We have to get the guarantees through international financial institutions. That's what sends the spirit of that we are going to rebuild this region. Thank you, honey. We have a question in the front here and then we'll go back. Hi, I'm Dr. Safa Nosreddin, former minister of ICT from Palestine. Infrastructure for development is essential and we in Palestine have the plans as government. We have the money from Peltel, the private sector, and we have the partnership, but we don't have access to technology and access to our spectrum, access to our frequency and 3G, we are maybe the last country that do not have the 3G frequency. Now people are speaking about 5G, not 3G. So how can the World Economic Forum and the international community here help us to have access to technology and access to our infrastructure in order to have development and economic prosperity? Thank you. Very good question. In fact, during the Regional Business Council we were given the mandate to look at the infrastructure issue and how public-private partnership can facilitate investments in the areas where it's needed, which under the chairmanship of Gordon Brown will take it to our global infrastructure initiative and definitely include this key challenge in the perspective and hopefully by Davos and the next meeting in Egypt in May we will have made significant progress. Can we go back to fourth row in the middle please? There's a mic, to your right, I think there's a mic. Hello, my name is Farid Yassin. I'm the Iraqi Ambassador to France and as such I co-chair with a colleague from OECD, Olivier Sanagé, a working group under the aegis of OECD to look at investment security in the Middle East, particularly for infrastructure. One of the things that'll be coming out of that work is a handbook devoted to PPP and it'll be written in such a way to facilitate the understanding of this topic by decision makers and to make it available to decision makers in the area. It's going to be translated into Arabic. I've seen in my own country in Iraq that a lot of people do not understand all the implications of PPP in particular, the need for a strong regulatory environment. But one of the other things that is addressed by the task force is the issue of how to bring Islamic finance as a resource into infrastructure funding. And maybe this is a better venue to discuss this. So I'd like you to comment on that. Thank you. Thank you. Any panelists on Islamic theory? Maybe we'll come to you. It is possible to bring Islamic finance but at the moment I think it's been done essentially through the like of guarantees. I mean the Islamic Development Bank for example has guaranteed one of the banks that was lending to the Turkish hospital program. But I do think that what is lacking is perhaps there's a partnership with people like EBRD, people that could bring expertise to unlock the balance sheet that they have because Islamic finance is actually quite abundant. But often what is lacking is the enabling facilitator to actually lend to those projects in a big way because I would really think that they can make a difference. I'm meeting the president of IDB tomorrow in Saudi Arabia. I'll personally convey the message as well. On the first point that was being made there about a guide to how more effective public-private partnerships could be constructed. I think that's an excellent idea. And the World Economic Forum is working with the OECD also on this idea of a sustainable credit facility whereby USAID, the Swedish Development Corporation and a number of private sector banks are offering to provide credit for infrastructure in emerging market countries. So that's a cooperative effort of the OECD and the World Economic Forum. Lady in the second row here and I will come to... This is Asmaa Global Shiver from Gaza Hub. So you have mentioned the investment in infrastructure for development. It has been in the area for a while now and unfortunately the impact has been little compared to the potentials in the area. And you've all mentioned that sustainability is very important and the stability of the region is very important as well. But unfortunately now the situation is much worse in different areas and countries in the minor region. So my question to you is although the situation is worse and we don't have the stability that you are seeking for investment, what can actually be done in order to tackle and to have an impact? And do you think that the public-private partnership is the only solution for what is happening and how we can take the agendas, the plan, the communities and the committees that is be done into an action and actions and steps that can be implemented in the ground? And my last question is how we as young people can have a role in that instead of just receiving the jobs that is created by the investment in infrastructure? Thank you. Ajit? Yeah, so, I mean, excellent point. I mean, that's I think the key message from this panel which Mr. Hani put eloquently. We can't wait for the stability to make the investment. The investment is going to help lead to the stability. I mean, if you look at post-war Europe, the U.S. didn't do the Marshall Plan, they didn't wait for all the embers to die down until everything was stable in Western Europe. They committed 5% of U.S. GDP, $12 billion at the time. And today's money would be $600 billion into Western Europe to stabilize and it had a political objective. It wasn't because to help Europeans per se, it was to stop the spread of communism and fight communism. And if we want to fight instability, extremism in our area, we need to look at it as a political objective. I totally agree with you. While recognizing that it does need the two things which were highlighted, it needs vision at the national level and the international level. And it needs reducing risk because private capital is a coward in a sense. I mean, it looks for stability and return. So how can we reduce that risk? And the issue of guarantees at the, again, national level and the multilateral level. We have Ms. Honda here from MIGA. So there are some international approaches to that as well. But we do need to drive the agenda forward while dealing with the political and conflict issues because if we wait, it's like a forest on fire and the fires are all over the forest in the Middle East. If we just keep going and trying to put out the forest fires without addressing the guy who's starting them all, we're never going to succeed. Okay. Thank you, John, very quickly. And then I want to go back to Bill. Just to add an exclamation point to this, I mean, we're talking about long-term investments in a short-term world. And the only way you get over that is to have a clear agenda, a clear vision, a clear plan that can withstand the test of time as far as governments are concerned. And if you get that, you will attract investors without it, it's going to be this project and that project and miscellaneous stuff and we'll be back next year and the year after and the year after talking about the same stuff. And in practical terms, if you want to build something in Gaza and you get a guarantee from MIGA together with a guarantee from Saudi Arabia, you will build anything you want. So it's not that difficult. Okay, thank you. First question. Go ahead, please. Thank you very, very, very much. I set an advisory board on IDB, Islamic Development Bank, and I know they're very active on infrastructure, since a very long time and raising an additional fund on that. And hence, I would recommend that anybody who is seeking Islamic product to go and approach them at this moment. I come from Oman, from an Oman Investment Fund, I'm a Chief Executive, and I wanted to assure Teri that capital is available, regionally, to invest in infrastructure project. The fact of the matter is that Oman has been at the forefront in terms of utility, a public-private initiatives, and we are seeking now to expand on those. So I would appreciate, if the panel could comment on the Canadian Infra project that Teri have alluded to, and what Jafar have alluded to as well in terms of the Jordanian Legislative Act that have come in this country. If you could, I'd be appreciative. Thank you. Teri and Dan. In the example of Canada, and I do recognize Oman is probably a leader in investing in this particular region, but perhaps an exception. The example of Canada is very simple. There's an enabling act at the federal level, but also at all the provinces, and they've basically concentrated in units, one federal and many regionals, the capacity of the government to contract infrastructure projects. And although it's called PPP Canada, those, these units is really focused on assessing every infrastructure projects from a project preparation perspective, then decide whether it's gonna be a PPP or not, if it's not, if it's the right thing, and then implementing it. So they have the full chain, the full delivery system in hand, and they have people that they employ somehow out of the government normal pay scale, or maybe they are in a sort of special scale. They're people that they come from the private sector, so they hire as a real agency, real talent, from all over, because they have a fairly strong budget to do that, and they keep them, they give them responsibility, and that's how it works. Thank you, Majid. I think the Jordan legislation part, maybe Mr. Hani would address it better, or? Go ahead. The question was on the, I'm not from Jordan, I don't know the details, but what I do understand is probably in the region, best in class in terms of government capacity for managing and implementing such investments and legislation, not just the legislation, but also the entities in the government to manage it. I think Jordan has actually set the standard. The airport that you all arrived at is an example of that, which was a public-private partnership, very successful model, so I think that kind of learning can be expanded across the region. Hani? Yes, well, two points I'd like to make. One is in our private-public partnership law, which was passed six months ago. It came as a natural step, too, after the privatization process. Now this puts the guidelines of how partnerships can work and what are the obligations of every party and how you can go and take loans. So this is the most important thing and how can you guarantee sovereign loans and on what percentage based on how much the investment is. But I also want to refer to the question from my colleague, the minister of telecommunications of Palestine. When we talk about PPI, when we talk about private, public, international, financial institution partnerships, we're not only talking about money. Please don't think that we're talking only about money. We're talking about technology. We're talking about transparency. We are talking about proper implementation and timely implementation of projects. So it's not only a partnership where somebody would give money and then share the paybacks. No, it's a complete partnership that takes all this into consideration when the partnership is casted. Thank you, Gordon. A quick remark and I will take one last question from the audience. I think that was a very important question about building up expertise within the public sector to be able to negotiate good public-private partnerships. And we actually set up a unit within Britain in the United Kingdom Treasury and it was so successful, it itself became a public-private partnership. And so there is a huge history that we can draw on of cooperation and building up expertise. I just want to come back very briefly to the brilliant question beforehand about what could be done to increase the stability of the region through investment. Now, infrastructure may seem a boring word to young people in the region, but the real key to the future of the region and to employment prospects is building up the infrastructure in such a way that there's prosperity and through prosperity people can see the benefits of peace and stability. And what I wanted to emphasize was that if governments within this region and if the region as a whole comes together to formulate better plans for infrastructure, there is now no shortage of international support to make these things come alive. Obviously the dynamism has got to come from within the region, but you have the new facility at the World Bank. You have a knowledge bank being created by the G20. You have a huge number of project preparation facilities and you have now first loss and second loss facilities being talked about that could be of great advantage to the countries in this region. So to think ahead, no shortage of support available if the dynamism could come from within the region to move this forward. And it's a great job creator as well as a great bringer of prosperity in the long run. Thank you, Gordon. We'll take one last question from the middle. Dem in the sixth row and then we'll wrap it up in the last one minute. If you can be quick, please and point your question to the panelists. Okay. Thank you very much for the discussion. My question is more about- If you can introduce yourself. Mohammed Tamalia. I'm a global shaper from the Jeddahub. We spoke about subsidies. We spoke about privatization. We touched upon it. My question is more about privatization. I mean, subsidies or if you want to look at economics or the GDPs of any of the economies, a lot of the burden, I mean, when it comes to spending, for example, Saudi Arabia on healthcare or so forth in education, it takes a bit of the burden on spending on infrastructure and other areas. So what is your view on privatization of areas such as healthcare in Saudi Arabia or in other regions in the GCC? And does the privatization help these governments in spending on other areas that are more probably pivotal in terms of infrastructure in those respective countries? Very good question, but unfortunately we ran out of time. So what I suggest we do is I'm not avoiding the question. We'll be here and I encourage you, you're part of the global shaper community. We are thrilled to have the youth engaged with the World Economic Forum in our initiatives. And thank you for raising the questions. And this panel discussion and interactive session shows us that investing in infrastructure is good for the region, it's good for the economy, it's good for the people, no matter what the political social context is. And we have seen success stories and I'm thrilled to see the will from the panelists and the audience to get together in a public-private cooperation setting. And we, as the World Economic Forum, invite all of you to join our Global Strategic Infrastructure Initiative, which is tackling these issues under the leadership of Gordon Brown. So thank you very much for...