Description
Palestine features a dynamic economy with high growth rates and a thriving entrepreneurial private sector. However, several binding constraints, both political and economic, are preventing the economic potential of Palestine from unfolding. The Palestinian National Development Plan 2011-2013 places a special emphasis on the need to increase and diversify exports in order to foster growth and development of the Palestinian economy. To achieve this goal the Palestinian Authority resolved to adopt a National Export Strategy, which would help Palestinian enterprises raise their export competitiveness on international markets and which would address the business environment for development and expanding exports. The Palestinian Authority and Palestinian TPO (PalTrade) were also successful in securing EU Commission funding for this initiative. The project aims at providing technical assistance and capacity-building in the designing of a National Export Strategy (NES). Through its design and later implementation by Palestinian stakeholders, the NES is expected to contribute to develop Palestine's exports and enhance their competitiveness, which in turn will drive employment creation, income generation, in particular improving livelihoods of women and youth, and the overall socio-economic development of the country. The project has 2 specific outcomes: 1) to enable Palestinian public and private stakeholders to design an export strategy, which will support export development and competitiveness, 2) to assist Palestinian stakeholders in establishing a formal public-private dialogue platform in the form of a National Export Council to conduct a dialogue supporting the mainstreaming of trade and the development of a national export culture. The output of the project is a NES document with a specific and measurable plan of action.