17th – 20th May, 2010
The Duke of York visits Malaysia
The Duke of York’s visit to Malaysia, one of South East Asia’s higest growth markets, built on his previous visits in 2007, 2004 and 2001.
The primary objective of his visit was to support and develop UK-Malaysia trade relations. Malaysia is an important trade partner of the UK with visible exports from the UK to Malasia of over £1 billion in 2009, and imports from Malaysia of £1.6 billion.
During the visit His Royal Highness called on Petronas, the National Oil Company. Petronas has made £800m of investments in the UK and has a wide range of collaborations with UK companies, including with Shell in Iraq, Rolls-Royce for power generation engines and many others.
Later, The Duke of York visited the campus of the University of Nottingham just outside Kuala Lumpar, in celebration of the University’s 10th anniversary in Malaysia. Links between the UK and Malaysia in the education sector are especially strong. Nottingham University students are just some of the 60,000 people currently studying for UK courses whilst based in Malaysia and there are over 12,000 Malaysians studying in the UK every year.
His Royal Highness also opened the HSBC Amanah branch (“Amanah” meaning “Trust”), which has become a leader in the growth sector of Islamic Finance.
The Duke of York gave a keynote speech at the UK-Malaysia Partnership Dialogue in which he promoted the strength of trade relations in areas as wide as manufacturing (Dyson), aerospace (Rolls-Royce), finance (HSBC), insurance (Prudential, Aviva) and motorsport (Lotus). These sectors were further discussed in a call on the Minister for International Trade and Industry, Datuk Seri Mustapa Mohamed.
Later, The Duke held a bilateral meeting with the Prime Minister, Dato’ Najib Razak, who has just completed his first year in office, guiding Malaysia on the recovery from the global recession.
His Royal Highness next delivered a keynote speech to over 1,000 delegates at the World Islamic Economic Forum. View the speech in full here.
The Duke of York’s final engagement was with Air Asia, the leading low budget airline in South East Asia and a major customer of Rolls-Royce and Airbus.
During the week, His Royal Highness also attended receptions and dinners to meet with representatives of the wide circle of British businesses in Malaysia, as well as with Malaysian inward investors to the UK.