mauritius

Mauritius (/məˈrɪʃəs/  or /məˈrɪʃiəs/; French: Maurice), officially the Republic of Mauritius (French: République de Maurice), is an island nation in the Indian Ocean about 2,000 kilometres (1,200 mi) off the southeast coast of the African continent. The country includes the islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues, 560 kilometres (350 mi) east of Mauritius, and the outer islands (Agaléga, St. Brandon and two disputed territories). The islands of Mauritius and Rodrigues form part of the Mascarene Islands, along with nearby Réunion, a French overseas department. The area of the country is 2,040 km² (790 sq mi). The capital and largest city is Port Louis. Formerly a Dutch colony (1638–1710) and a French colony (1715–1810), Mauritius became a British colonial possession in 1810 and remained so until 1968, the year in which it attained independence. The British crown colony of Mauritius once included the current territories of Mauritius, Rodrigues, the outer islands of Agaléga, St. Brandon, Chagos Archipelago, and Seychelles. The Mauritian territories gradually devolved with the creation of a separate colony of Seychelles in 1903 and the excision of the Chagos Archipelago in 1965. The sovereignty over the Chagos Archipelago is disputed between Mauritius and the United Kingdom (UK). The UK excised the archipelago from Mauritian territory in 1965, three years prior to Mauritian independence. The UK gradually depopulated the archipelago's indigenous population and leased its biggest island, Diego Garcia, to the United States. Access to the archipelago is prohibited to casual tourists, the media, and its former inhabitants. Mauritius also claims sovereignty over Tromelin Island from France.

- hkej 19dec27, 22dec17 shum article

Government
- The Economic Development Board (EDB) www.edbmaritius.org which has been set up following the EDB Act which was passed in the National Assembly in July this year to promote investment has as Chairperson Mr Joseph Charles Cartier who has been appointed on 20 November 2017 by the President of the Republic, Dr Ameenah Gurib-Fakim, upon consultation with the Leader of Opposition, Mr Xavier Duval. The Prime Minister, Minister of Home Affairs, External Communications and National Development Unit, Minister of Finance and Economic Development, Mr Pravind Kumar Jugnauth, made this announcement on 21 November 2017 in reply to a Parliamentary Question on the proposed establishment of the Economic Development Board for Investment Promotion. The EDB will group and consolidate entities involved in the investment promotion chain in view of ensuring greater coherence in policies and actions implementation. The institutions are namely: Board of Investment (BOI), Financial Services Promotion Agency (FSPA), Enterprise Mauritius (EM) and Mauritius Africa Fund (MAF). Prime Minister Jugnauth reiterated the importance of putting in place the EDB as announced in the Budget Speech 2017-2018 to strengthen institutional capacity to support growth objectives. He further stated that the Vice-Chairperson and other Members of the EDB will be appointed shortly and highlighted that once the Board has been constituted, action will be initiated for the recruitment of the Chief Executive Officer to drive the process of merger of the above mentioned organisations. The EDB which will be the main business licensing agency in Mauritius will comprise of three directorates namely: National and Sectoral Economic Development Planning; Investment and Export Promotion (Integration of BOI, EM, FSPA and MAF); and Business Licensing Agency (Implementation of e-Licensing business platform). http://www.govmu.org/English/News/Pages/Chairperson-of-Economic-Development-Board-appointed.aspx

• offices in paris, new delhi and johannesburg
• people

• kesheela kejiou, investment executive, manufacturing (traditional)

Saint Hubert (village)
- to kiv

company
-  The ABC Group of companies is one of the largest conglomerates of Mauritius, ranked in the Top 100 business organizations of the Indian Ocean. ABC was founded in 1931 by Sir Moi Lin Jean Ah-Chuen who set up ABC Store, a very modest shop in one of the busiest streets of Port Louis (the capital city of Mauritius). Today the ABC Group operates under 5 main Divisions: Automobile, Banking, Financial Services, Foods and Shipping & Logistics.https://www.abcgroup.mu/who-we-are/index.html

• founder 朱梅麟（Moilin Jean Ah-Chuen 1911-1991），祖籍梅江区城北玉水村，1942年当选毛里求斯华商总会主席，是毛里求斯立法会委员，也是第一个进入立法会的华人，前后担任国会议员，地区事务部部长，担任财政部部长 。毛里求斯政府为感念朱氏推动民主、发展经济的贡献，特于1998 年发行印有朱梅麟头像的25 卢比钞票纪念，朱梅麟因此成为被印在外国钱币上的华人。

• singtao 26apr18 f2
• donald ah-cheung, descendent of chu wei chuen china daily 21jul18 "one chinese family's legacy in paradise"  

• abc banking has a rep office in hk scmp 12mar18

- bank

• The Bank of Mauritius is the central bank of the Republic of Mauritius. It was established in September 1967 as the central bank of Mauritius. It was modelled on the Bank of England and was, in effect, set up with the assistance of senior officers of the Bank of England. Amongst its responsibilities is the issuance of the Mauritian currency, the Mauritian rupee.  
  In the 19th Century three separate commercial banks, now all defunct, operated under the Bank of Mauritius name. The first Bank of Mauritius started operations in 1813 or so, but survived only until 1825. The second Bank of Mauritius was a British overseas bank with two boards of directors, one in London and the other in Port Louis. It began operations in 1832 and favored the interests of the planter class. In 1838 traders established Mauritius Commercial Bank to give themselves an alternative source of credit as until its establishment the Bank of Mauritius had a monopoly on the island. The financial crisis of 1847 in London resulted in the collapse of the sugar market, and severe losses to both of Mauritius's banks. Bank of Mauritius ceased business in 1848, though the Mauritius Commercial Bank has survived to the present.
  Local interests established the third Bank of Mauritius in 1894 to take over the local business of the failed New Oriental Bank Corporation. In 1911 the bank opened a branch in the Seychelles. However, in 1916 the Mercantile Bank of India (est. 1893) acquired the bank. HSBC in turn acquired the Mercantile Bank in 1959. Because of this history, HSBC refers to itself as the oldest foreign bank in Mauritius. The next foreign bank to arrive, and to survive to the present, was National Bank of South Africa, an ancestor of Barclays Bank Mauritius.
  In addition to the above three banks, a bank by the name of the Colonial Bank of Mauritius, Bourbon, and Dependencies, operated between 1812 and 1813.

•  State Bank of Mauritius (SBM), is a bank in Mauritius. It is licensed as a commercial bank by the Bank of Mauritius, the national banking regulator.
•  Mauritius Commercial Bank, founded in 1838, is the oldest and largest banking institution of Mauritius. It is also the oldest banking institution south of the Sahara and one of the oldest banks of the Commonwealth to have preserved its original name. MCB has a local network of 40 modern branches and 150 ATMs. The holding structure of the MCB Group translates its two-fold strategy namely diversification into financial services through local subsidiaries and associated companies and regional expansion through its foreign subsidiaries. MCB operates in Madagascar, Maldives, Mozambique and Seychelles. The Group has also consolidated its presence in Réunion,  Mayotte and Paris through BFCOI, its associate. The MCB opened a representative office in Johannesburg, South Africa in 2008. Moreover, the Group is actively involved in project and trade financing in various countries of the sub-Saharan region, while being engaged in other markets such as India.
• AfrAsia Bank Limited, commonly known as AfrAsia Bank, is authorized and regulated by the Bank of Mauritius.^[2] Headquartered in the Mauritius International Financial Centre with representative office in South Africa, AfrAsia specialises in banking that builds bridges between Africa, Asia and the World.The bank was founded by Jamess Benoit (resigned as of 2016) and others in 2007, in Mauritius. 

- Belvedere Management is a financial services group based in Mauritius that claims to have $16 billion of assets under administration. In March 2015, Offshore Alert described the group as a Ponzi scheme and it is currently under investigation by regulators in South Africa, Mauritius and Guernsey. The group is managed by Irish businessman David Cosgrove, Mauritian accountant Kenneth Maillard, and South African fund manager Cobus Kellermann.

trade and investment environment
- food processing

• [edb brochure] the reigstration certificate (food processing) has been introduced to promote global value chain through the cultivation and importation of agricultural products to be used as raw materials for processing into intermediate and finished products and to encourage re-export activities

industry
- sugar

• sugar factories established throughout the island in early 1970s

- textile

• creation of export processing zone to develop textile and apparel industries in early 1970s; the industry gained momentum over the next decades and markets include europe, USA and south africa

- fintech

• [edb brochure] committed to position mauritius as a fintech hub for africa with the setting-up of a fintech and innovation driven financial services regulatory committee.  The grant of a sandbox licence to SALT technology ltd, the first blockchain project in mauritius and a p2p lending license to fundkiss technologies ltd.  In 2016, the government created a regulatory sandbox scheme to look at innovative projects for mauritius at the level of the EDB

Ft supp 29sep16, 5oct17

people
- https://www.forbes.com/sites/mfonobongnsehe/2017/09/19/5-multi-millionaires-from-mauritius-you-should-know/#6786325b4d89

disapora
- [edb brochure] the mauritian diaspora scheme has been set up with a view to attract members of the mauritian diaspora back to mauritius to participate in the economic development of the country.  Any member of the mauritian diaspora who, before 24 mar 2015, has been living and working outside mauritius and has the necessary skills, talent and experience and who is willing to retern and serve mauritius is eligible to apply for registration under the scheme


india
- ft 25oct18 India’s plans on archipelago in Mauritius cause unease


chinese
- association

• The Chinese Chamber of Commerce was founded on 8th December 1908. It is the second oldest overseas Chinese Chamber of Commerce. The first overseas Chinese Chamber of Commerce was set up in Singapore in 1906. The first President was Mr Chan Wan Yee.  Among those who served as President in more recent times,was Sir Jean Moilin Ah-Chuen, who was also Minister of Local  Government, and Mr Marc Fok Tseung, who was a Member of Parliament and the Mayor of Port Louis.  Messrs Adrien Konfortion, Jabin Hsu and Wong Hew Peng served dutifully as the Chamber’s Secretary for many years. http://cccmauritius.org/

- financial

• https://www.myt.mu/sinformer/dossiers/business/456872/official-launch-of-the-bank-of-china-mauritius-ltd.html 

- tourism

• http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/weekend/2017-03/18/content_28600174.htm The Mauritius tourism authority paid a visit to Shanghai on Feb 15.The delegation metChinese travel operators to better understand the Chinese market and introduced localtourism resources to attract more mainlanders to "the pearl on the Indian Ocean".

china
- 記者從中國商務部獲悉，中國與毛里求斯於2日結束中毛自由貿易協定談判，這一協定是中國與非洲國家商簽的首個自貿協定，下一步雙方將為最終簽署協定作好準備。據介紹，中國是毛里求斯最大的貿易夥伴國和進口來源國，兩國貿易投資合作規模逐年上升，反映出中毛經貿投資合作發展的勃勃生機。在基礎設施建設、金融合作以及文化交流等領域，中毛兩國合作也取得了豐碩成果。http://pdf.wenweipo.com/2018/09/04/a02-0904.pdf

• http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/2019-10/17/c_138480183.htm China and Mauritius signed a free trade agreement (FTA) here Thursday, the first FTA between China and an African country, according to the Ministry of Commerce (MOC). The China-Mauritius FTA is the 17th FTA signed by China.The agreement covers trade in goods and services and investment and economic cooperation.The FTA will not only provide a more powerful institutional guarantee to deepen bilateral economic and trade relations, but also boost China-Africa economic and trade cooperation, according to the MOC.Negotiations on the China-Mauritius FTA were officially launched in December 2017. The two sides formally concluded the negotiations on Sept. 2, 2018, after four rounds of intensive negotiations.In the area of trade in goods, China and Mauritius will eventually achieve zero tariffs on 96.3 percent and 94.2 percent of product tariff items, respectively, involving 92.8 percent of import volume for both countries from each other.For the remaining tariff items of Mauritius, the tariffs will also be greatly cut, and the maximum tariffs for most of the involved products will not exceed 15 percent.China's main exports to Mauritius, such as iron and steel products, textiles and other light industrial products, will benefit from it.Special sugar produced in Mauritius will also enter the Chinese market gradually.The two sides also agreed on rules of origin, trade remedies, technical barriers to trade and sanitary and phytosanitary issues.In the area of trade in services, China and Mauritius both promised to open up more than 100 sub-sectors.Mauritius will open up more than 130 sub-sectors in important service fields such as communications, education, finance, tourism, culture, transportation and traditional Chinese medicine to China.This is the highest level of opening up in the field of services in Mauritius so far.In the field of investment, the agreement has been greatly upgraded from the 1996 China-Mauritius bilateral investment protection agreement in terms of protection scope, protection level and dispute settlement mechanism.This is the first time that China has upgraded the previous investment protection agreement with an African country, which will not only provide stronger protection for Chinese enterprises to go to Mauritius, but also help them further boost investment cooperation in Africa through the platform of Mauritius, according to the MOC.Meanwhile, the two sides also agreed to further deepen economic and technical cooperation in agriculture, finance, medical care, tourism and other fields.

- chinese cultural center

• Mauritius President Prithvirajsing Roopun attended a party to welcome the new director of the China Cultural Center in Mauritius on Jan 31.http://en.chinaculture.org/2020-02/06/content_1475027.htm

China and Hong Kong
- http://paper.takungpao.com/resfile/PDF/20140714/PDF/b2_screen.pdf

taiwan
- 台灣的行政院客家委員會原定於本周二至下月七日在非洲島國毛里裘斯，與當地客家社團合辦「客家美食周」。惟客委會在上周六接獲通知，大陸向舉辦活動的酒店施壓，活動被迫取消。對此，陸委會主任李永得批評陸方做法粗暴無禮，表示強烈抗議與不滿。台外交部亦嚴厲譴責，並指已請駐南非代表處持續關注並提供協助。http://orientaldaily.on.cc/cnt/china_world/20180226/00178_005.html

hong kong
- news supp

• china daily special 24may17 
• scmp national day supp 12mar18, 12mar19

- investors from mauritius

•  https://business.mega.mu/2017/02/09/abc-banking-corporation-simplante-hong-kong/ ABC Banking Corporation disposera très prochainement d’un bureau de représentation à Hong Kong à la suite de l’obtention d’une licence de la Hong Kong Monetary Authority, le 18 janvier. Par le biais de cette présence à Hong Kong, ABC Banking Corporation se donne les moyens de développer ses activités offshores, en mettant aux services d’investisseurs chinois de nombreux avantages. L’adhésion de Maurice aux différentes organisations africaines, tels la Southern Africa Development Community ou le Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa, est aussi un argument clé pour ces investisseurs. Il faut, à cela, ajouter les traités signés avec d’autres pays en Afrique pour encourager l’investissement.

•  http://pdf.wenweipo.com/2017/03/10/a01-0310.pdf congrat ad

- hk people in mauritius

• appledaily 29may19 hk emigrant in mauritius

country info
- ft 30oct18 "mauritius at 50" supp