Day Two of IGCF 2014 Discusses Impact of Government Communication on Reputation of Countries

Sharjah-UAE: 23 February, 2014 – Day two of the International Government Communication Forum 2014 (IGCF 2014) hosted a session on the role of communication and public relations in managing the reputation of countries and securing direct investments.

Titled ‘Role of Government Communications and Reputation Management in Attracting Foreign Direct Investments (FDI)’, the session drew the participation of Felipe Calderón, former President of Mexico, James Wolfensohn, former President of the World Bank Group, and His Excellency Dr. Anwar Mohammed Gargash, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs/Minister of State for Federal National Council Affairs. Tim Sebastian, former presenter of BBC’s popular ‘HARDtalk’, moderated the discussions.

Felipe Calderón said: “It is important to note that improving perception through transparent communication enhances a country’s attractiveness to foreign investors and leads to registering sustainable profit and revenue. There is currently an obvious lack of trust in governments, and the only way to change this and build credibility amongst the people and the media is through transparency and consistency.”

Calderon also stressed that it is imperative to create channels for interacting with the youth and people to convey political messages and policies. He said: “Governments need to build a two-way dialogue structure. Such direct interchange with people could be established during events and forums or through social media channels.”

Observing the role of government communication in enhancing the reputation of the state to achieve growth and drive investment inflows, James Wolfensohn said: “The current global system does not make it easy to build a sense of coherence about the future, which is why predictability is a must.

“It is very clear to me that individual investors in the past couple of years have been highly active. They regard themselves as international citizens investing in shares rather than tangible assets. Through communication and an open dialogue, you provide the investors with a sense of inclusion in the process. Such an engagement leads to continuity.”

Speaking about the challenges and lessons learnt from the experiences of other countries, and citing the UAE as an example, His Excellency Dr. Gargash said: “Consistency with policy is regarded as a key pillar in improving reputation. The UAE has chosen a clear path to accomplish this objective.

“Each country has its own set of challenges and opportunities with regards to drawing foreign investments. In the UAE, I believe we have established our own mechanisms to respond to such challenges through addressing the issues at the internal level before conveying our strategy to the external world.”

He concluded: “There is an inaccurate portrayal of the UAE, and for that we mainly need to change the narrative. Government communications are a necessity because governments have multiple layers of messaging and the narrative has to be built according to the specific message you are trying to portray in a transparent and credible manner.”

It is worth noting that recent studies have reiterated that countries that have succeeded in raising the level of their reputation by just five degrees on the international reputation index enjoy additional tourist incomes annually as long as their reputation is maintained. A good reputation worldwide works to attract people to invest, visit and stay in the country, buy national products, study, work, and enjoy the services.

The first regional government communication event was organised by Sharjah Media Centre (SMC) in 2012. The forum discussed relevant communication challenges that were triggered by the socio-political occurrences in the Arab world. IGCF 2014 is a first-of-its-kind event that articulates SMC’s efforts to develop government communication mechanisms for the benefit of government institutions in the UAE and wider region.