A New Initiative to Boost Cross-Border Investment in the Digital Economy has been launched

• The World Economic Forum and the Digital Cooperation Organization are launching a new Digital FDI initiative
• Nigeria to pilot the public-private projects to be rolled out by the initiative, bringing together government and business to create ‘digital friendly’ investment climates across various countries
• The initiative will be a continuation of the work the World Economic Forum started in 2020, when a white paper on policies, regulations and measures to attract FDI in the digital economy was published

A pioneering effort to facilitate cross-border investment in the digital economy was launched this week at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting 2022.

The new initiative on digital foreign direct investment, the Digital FDI initiative, will implement projects in several countries to help grow Digital FDI, as the reforms to attract such investment must take place at a country level. The first digital FDI project will take place in Nigeria.

Over the past few years, the Forum has worked to find the right partners to guide the work, develop principles published in the white paper launched in 2020 and share the potential for cooperation at the G20 and other platforms of corporation.

Attracting Digital FDI requires creating digital-friendly investment climates through targeted and country-specific policies, regulations and measures. These investments involve new business models, often based on data and technology, and platform economies, as well as using non-traditional assets. The Digital FDI initiative will aim to identify and implement enabling reforms through public-private projects in emerging markets and developing countries.