英语文摘:Bahrain trying to be more competitive in wooing investments

MANAMA, Dec. 2 (Xinhua) -- The Bahrain Finance Minister announced on Sunday to focus on boosting the country's economic competitiveness to woo more local and overseas investments, according to Bahrain News Agency (BNA).

The biennial state budget draft law would be reviewed soon by the parliament and it also aims to create more high-caliber job opportunities both in the public and the private sector to reduces unemployment rate, Finance Ministry's assistant undersecretary for economic affairs, Mr. Yusuf Abdullah Humood told BNA in a statement.

He said that the new state budget of 2013-14 stands around 18.6 billion U.S. dollars, which targets the boost of overall demand via increasing government demand on investment and consumer services and products, reduction of investment costs in the private sector and attracting more overseas investments to Bahrain.

Bahrain reaped 781 million dollars in investments in 2011, according to latest UN Commerce and Development (UNCTAD) reports.

Humood announced the allocation of around 1.2 billion dollars for the infrastructure sector that is an equivalent of 41.5 percent of the total expenditure on projects to attract investments.