D8 Secretary General Visists OIC Headquaters

Jakarta - Dr. Widi A. Pratikto, the Secretary General of D8, paid an official visit to the OIC Headquarters in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, on April 22-23, in line with the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the OIC General Secretariat and the General Secretariat of D-8 Organisation for Economic Cooperation on 7 October 2010. The Secretary General of D8 was received Prof. Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, the Secretary General of OIC, the D8 Secretariat said in a press statement here over the weekend. The two sides exchanged views on the potential areas for collaboration, including coordination of their various activities in order to enhance synergy and effective implementation of their developmental programmes. In addition to on-going collaboration in the domain of trade promotion, agriculture and food security, as well as tourism development, the Secretary General of D8 welcomed the proposal for the sensitization of OIC Members States in D8 on the implementation of TPS-OIC and establishment of the relevant capacity building programmes in the fisheries sector for Somalia. The Secretary General of OIC observed that cooperation between the two Organisations was very significant, considering the fact that all the D8 Member States are also Members of the OIC, and they account for about 70% of the OIC population as well as its GDP. (*)