A huge variety will be on display: hydraulics, energy, irrigation, not to mention petrochemicals, materials and equipment for agriculture and food production, and the electrical and electronic industries. Italian companies will be going to the Maghreb in a fighting spirit, ready to showcase the best that industry can offer in terms of consumer goods and equipment. The Algiers trade fair, which runs from June 2^nd-7^th, provides them with one of the premiere shop windows.

This event is now being staged for the forty-third time, and has the unusual characteristic of being aimed at many sectors. It therefore affords business opportunities in a variety of fields for the collective coordinated by the Italian Trade Commission, which this year will be composed of 69 companies. For the participants it will be an important opportunity to explore the potential of the Algerian market, in a country whose balance of payments is still in the black, and in which the most important products are industrial equipment and machinery, followed by agricultural products and consumer goods.

Visitors and representatives of local businesses, on the other hand, will have an enviable opportunity to admire the very latest in terms of innovation by visiting the stands of the Italian companies. They will have the chance to experiment with new car-wash systems, for example, or equipment for supplying and refrigerating micro-filtered water, sand-blasting and shot blasting apparatus, industrial generators and motor welders. In addition, in this varied, comprehensive and high quality display, there are circular machines for making socks for men, women and children, diamond tools for civil engineering, telescopic lifters, and very high precision irrigation systems.

The Italian collective on show at the fair will therefore be able to satisfy even the most demanding of tastes, and will provide new business opportunities sure to raise Italy even above the third place it achieved in 2009 among suppliers of goods to Algeria, with an export growth of 8.83%. Only France achieved better results (with a 16.86% improvement on figures for 2008), and China (with a 14% increase). Algerian imports from Italy, increasing by 13.63% in the last year and equivalent to 183.5 million Euros, indicate that the positive trend is already under way and that there will be further increases, especially in key sectors such as electrical goods and non-electrical household equipment. However, figures relating to Algerian exports to Italy are also indicative of the way the market is performing and deserve careful examination.

In 2009, Italy registered as Algeria’s second most important customer after the USA despite an 8.15% drop in exports compared with figures for the previous year. Particularly evident was the hydrocarbon sector, which represents almost the total demand from Italy to this African country. The challenge facing Italy in Algiers is therefore to give a new impetus to exports without neglecting the import market, especially if the climate is good for arranging new, and more advantageous commercial agreements.