Regional and International Economic Cooperation
On 09 October 2023, around 50 members gathered for a workshop organized by Business Mauritius in collaboration with Future Minds. The event aimed to boost AI awareness and explore the potential impacts, ethical considerations, and strategies behind effective AI integration, as well as the opportunities it presents for businesses.
The 2024 Business Pulse Survey report was presented on 15 November 2023 at a launch event held at Caudan Arts Centre. Produced in partnership with the UNDP and Statistics Mauritius, the Survey was carried out by DCDM Research and aimed to assess business recovery and resilience in Mauritius following the COVID-19 pandemic. Among the main highlights, the report showed that 98 percent of surveyed enterprises were back to operating normally. This was the 3rd Business Pulse Survey by Business Mauritius, with the first and second editions having been in 2020 and 2021 respectively.
In November 2023, Business Mauritius partnered with the Central Procurement Board (CPB), the Procurement Policy Office (PPO), and the Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC), to host the business community for a half-day workshop. The objective was to create awareness on the procurement system in Mauritius, and promote a collaborative environment between the business community and the authorities around public procurement. One hundred and sixty participants attended the workshop.
The World Bank’s CPSD Report for Mauritius was launched in December 2023 at Maison Eureka, Moka in a joint event with Business Mauritius. The report examines Mauritius’s transition towards a knowledge-intensive economy with an emphasis on renewable energy, higher education, healthcare, and innovation as a cross-cutting theme. The event included a panel discussion, moderated by Dr. Sen Narrainen, former Senior Economic Advisor to the Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning and Development and including Prof. Bahorun (MRIC), Jeremy Charoux (APHEI), Olivier Gaering (Qair Group), Archana Bhaw-Luximon (Centre for Biomedical and Biomaterials Research), and Nirmala Jeetah (Economic Development Board).
In February 2024, the UNDP in close collaboration with the National Economic Collaboration and the Sustainability & Inclusive Growth teams hosted the Inaugural training on SDG Impact Standards for Enterprises at The Ravenala Attitude Hotel, Balaclava. Some 40 enterprises participated in this intensive 3-day training to learn how to use the SDG Impact Standards as voluntary management standards to guide them on their sustainability journeys. Building on the priorities identified in the Mauritius SDG Investor Map, launched in 2022, the training hosted 40 selected enterprises, aiming to equip them to operate sustainably and contribute positively to the SDGs.
Upon request from the South African High Commission, Business Mauritius was pleased to host a study tour for around 20 MBA students and their lead academics from Wits Business School. The tour, which took place twice this year, is part of a broader objective to expose students to cultural diversity, allowing them to gain unique insight into the origins, opportunities and challenges faced by businesses, government organisations in emerging and developed markets and the strategies to solve those problems.
After several months of development, Business Mauritius’s SME Procurement Platform, Business Link, was launched at an event held in the Labourdonnais Waterfront Hotel in Caudan on 7 August 2024. Developed with the support of the UNDP, Business Link is designed to connect SMEs and larger enterprises through their procurement needs. The project reflects Business Mauritius’s commitment to empowering SMEs through greater opportunities to build collaborative partnerships within the industry.
The ShiftXchange Conference by Middlesex University in partnership with STADIO Higher Education and Business Mauritius took place in August 2024. The conference provided a platform to share experiences, discuss challenges, and explore good practices within the evolving digital landscape. The National Economic Collaboration team curated a plenary session focusing on digital solutions using enterprise AI and data sciences which go beyond the simple generative capabilities of AI.