“Spanish-Maltese business relations have moved into high gear following the recent visit here of 30 senior executives,” Spain’s Ambassador to Malta, Felipe de la Morena Casado told this paper in an exclusive interview.

“They were from 17 leading companies active in sectors identified as priorities for Malta in its 2015 Vision – such as tourism, renewable energies, ICT, biotechnology, energy efficiency, water, financial services, pharmaceuticals, aviation. These business leaders held one-on-one networking meetings with top executives of 62 Maltese companies and many opportunities were identified and return visits planned.

“This highly successful event was organised jointly by Malta Enterprise, the highly dynamic Spanish-Maltese Chamber of Commerce, the Embassy of Malta in Madrid and the Spanish confederation of business organisations (Confederación Española de Organizaciones Empresariales) as well as our embassy here.”

The packed programme included two receptions at the embassy residence as well as a seminar at Malta Enterprise opened by Tonio Fenech, Minister of Finance, Economy and Investment, followed by presentations about business opportunities in both Spain and Malta as well as on Malta’s financial services sector. The group also visited the Malta Chamber of Commerce, Enterprise and Industry.

“Next year the Embassy plans to hold a seminar for the Malta business community on investment and trade with Spain,” the ambassador added “as well as other seminars and product promotion events. In addition, Malta Enterprise has announced that it is going to organise a business delegation to Spain.”

Trade and investments flows between the two countries are developing well.

According to Spanish statistics, Spain’s exports to Malta in 2011 totalled €216m, imports by Spain from Malta reached €64m, total trade thus amounting to €280m as compared to €181m in 2008, €232m in 2009 and €259m in 2010.

Spanish foreign direct investment in Malta in 2011 was €24m, down from €74m in 2010 while Maltese investments in Spain totalled €53m, up from €28m in 2010.

“Spanish investments in Malta have focused in insurance, reinsurance, pharmaceuticals (three companies setting up manufacturing operations here) while several Maltese companies operate franchises for a range of goods, including clothes, food and beverages. Mapfre, the leading Spanish insurer recently acquired a majority stake in Middlesea Insurance. Its chief operating officer Alfredo Munoz has succeeded Francis Vassallo as chairman of the Spanish-Maltese Chamber of Commerce.”

Political relations between the two nations have continued to strengthen through a series of official visits.

“Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy attended the 5+5 Summit in Malta on 5-6 October accompanied by our Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, José Manuel García-Margallo and an important delegation of senior officials. In bilateral talks held during the summit both prime ministers recognised this excellent moment of our relations and discussed issues relating to the economic situation in Europe and EU affairs. Prior to that, there was the official visit by our Minister of Agriculture. In fact, throughout this year there have been quite a number of high level visits to Malta (Spanish Auditors, senior officials from the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education and the Air Force, among others).”

Cultural relations are also developing well since nearly 100,000 Spanish tourists came to Malta last year, including 34,000 on cruises and 7,000 language students, some of which under Spanish government grants. Meanwhile, the Spanish language is proving increasingly popular here.

“Spanish is a growing language worldwide,” Ambassador de la Morena explained. “In fact, it is the first language for 400 million people in the world, a second language for another 100 million and the second most studied in the world after English. The Spanish-Maltese Cultural Centre in Valletta, set up 30 years ago, has taught Spanish to nearly 6,000 people.

“Spanish is also being taught at Maltese secondary schools and at the university by the very dynamic Spanish Studies Department headed by Professor Carmel Vassallo, also promoting many other aspects of Spain. Once a year, the embassy organises the Day of Spanish during which 100 schoolchildren learning the language attend an open door cultural event at the residence.”

Spain and Malta have so far signed four bilateral agreements – between the Spanish School of Diplomacy and the Mediterranean Academy of Diplomatic Studies, their respective Ministries of Education on Spanish language assistance in Maltese primary and secondary schools with the remaining two on archives and patrimony issues.”

The Spanish embassy also worked with Heritage Malta to organise the recent exhibition of the Khalili collection of damascene artifacts, has organised a Spanish film festival at St James Cavalier, and concerts in Gozo.

Turning to the Mediterranean, the ambassador emphasised that Spain and Malta had the same deep and active commitment to the region. “Our Mediterranean policy is justified by shared culture, the common challenges its presents that have to be addressed jointly in a coordinated manner and because it is an excellent space for dialogue with the Arab world.

“A lot has happened over the last year. In the aftermath of the Arab spring, there is a new regional context and many new initiatives have been presented. All of this obliges us to redefine our policy towards the Mediterranean in the sense of redesigning and coordinating existing initiatives with the objective of transforming the Mediterranean into a zone of security and stability – reinforcing human rights, the rule of law the role of civil society. It should also become an area of growth and economic development, and an example of regional cooperation. We would like to see the Union for the Mediterranean (whose secretariat is based in Barcelona) playing a key role, since it can have the ability to coordinate many currently existing initiatives in the region.

“In addition, we consider essential to enhance sub-regional cooperation and consequently value the 5+5 Dialogue as a flexible forum to promote cooperation in different fields. The excellent 5+5 Summit set the basis for a more intense regional cooperation.

 “Finally, we are contributing new initiatives to the region, such as the one we presented together with Morocco in September at a side meeting during the UN General Assembly, which will promote mediation as a method to resolve conflicts in the region. We are now identifying focal points in each country including Malta.”

Latin America, all of its countries but Brazil being former Spanish colonies, is another priority area for Spain’s foreign policy, rooted in strong human, historical, social, cultural, political and economic bonds.

“Spain’s Ibero-American foreign policy seeks to accommodate bilateral relations to the peculiarities of each country,” the ambassador stated, “to enhance dialogue and mechanisms of political cooperation and continue to explore the economic opportunities that Latin America currently offers, both in terms of investment and trade. Furthermore, as an EU member state, Spain plays a key role in the design of European policy for Latin America.

“On 16 and 17 November, the 22nd Ibero-American Summit of Heads of State and Government took place in Cadiz, coinciding with the 200th anniversary of our Constitution of 1812, when political representatives from Spain, Ibero-American colonies and nations as well as the Philippines met in this city. The event gave birth to a new social and political system in which sovereignty was given to the people, a text that subsequently inspired both political and constitutional law and influenced the future liberal movements throughout Europe and Latin America.”

The annual 22-nation Ibero-American Conference of heads of state and government comprises 19 Latin American nations together with Spain, Portugal and Andorra. 

This year’s conference, chaired by His Majesty King Juan Carlos of Spain adopted a wide range of action programmes including a key document to promote growth of small and medium-sized enterprises. Between summits, the conference is continued at different political levels focusing on a range of sectoral questions and is serviced by the Ibero-American General Secretariat (Secretaria General Ibero-Americana).

As regard Spain’s current situation, Ambassador de la Morena admitted that his country was going through “a difficult economic and financial time”.

“However, I want to insist that the Spanish government is doing its utmost to overcome this situation. It is in the process of reforming public government, has engaged in a programme of fiscal consolidation, which includes very tough austerity measures, in compliance with our EU commitments. It has also approved very necessary structural reforms to modernise our economy and of course it is also implementing important reforms in the financial sector. These measures will increase our competitiveness, help us regain a comprehensive fiscal stability, create growth and of course create new jobs.

“We must also bear in mind that the highly diversified Spanish economy has very strong fundamentals, a highly trained labour force and leading world companies in a number of different sectors (telecommunications, rail transport, infrastructures, traditional and renewable energy and environmental industries among others). Spain is the 10th (FDI) investor in the world and the second investor in Latin America. It is also the second tourist destination worldwide (59 million tourists in 2011).

“Hopefully all these elements will bring us out of the crisis soon. The current crisis facing the EU needs a political solution and goes through a banking union, a fiscal union, an economic union and political union. We clearly need more Europe.”