Rui Rodrigues manages to list several barriers to Mozambican business in China. Difficulty in obtaining visas, high cost of airfares and limitations at the production level are some of them.

"At this stage, we just want to see the visa problem resolved, for now, that is, at least to have access and resolve the issue of travel", said in Macau to journalists the representative of the consultant Zhuhai Hengqin East Africa, on the sidelines of a meeting of businessmen, at the sixth ministerial conference of the Forum for Economic and Commercial Cooperation between China and Portuguese-speaking Countries, known as the Macau Forum.

Resolving the visa issue is "a great starting point", since Mozambican businessmen recognize "great difficulty in accessing documentation and a lot of bureaucracy" in order to visit China.

Obtaining residency in Macau could be a next step: "Next, logically, we will try to talk about the problem of residency, because investors also want to resolve it in a stable way so that they can continue with their investments", he said.

More specific measures for establishing residency are also an aspiration of the Portuguese business community, according to a representative of the Agency for Investment and Foreign Trade of Portugal (AICEP).

"What we have received as 'feedback' from our businessmen is that in fact, because they would like and seek for there to be a regime that is more specific, that is, from an administrative point of view, more expeditious. And it is legitimate that this be so for all these administrative processes and obtaining residency", said Luís Rebelo de Sousa.

The executive member of the Board of Directors of AICEP noted that "this greater diligence" can contribute "obviously to Macau being a more competitive region for attracting Portuguese investment".

Unless an exceptional regime is created, at this moment, access to the Macau Resident Card (BIR) "is only for people who meet talent criteria", as stipulated by the regime for attracting qualified personnel, approved last year, the jurist and Portuguese deputy to the Legislative Assembly of Macau José Pereira Coutinho told Lusa.

"The way it is done [the law], at this moment, I do not see a window that can in fact meet these conditions, but if the businessman, in professional terms, meets the conditions that are established under the new law, it is possible. But only as a businessman, a simple businessman, I do not see that there is a follow-up", he added.

"I think it should be in Portugal's interest to try to find a strategy here, because Macau is important for our relations", reacted a member of the Portugal-China Young Entrepreneurs Association, also present at the meeting.

Pedro Ferreirinha believes that Macau is still an opportunity: "Then it is a question of costs. What I have talked about with young entrepreneurs is a question of considering (...) costs. Sometimes it is more worthwhile to invest directly in China than to go through Macau. And now there have been other difficulties, which is obtaining the BIR, the identity cards of residency, which also complicate things here".

China established the Macau Special Administrative Region (MSAR) as a platform for strengthening economic and commercial cooperation with Portuguese-speaking countries in 2003 and, in the same year, created the Macau Forum.

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