JEDDAH, 12 May 2008 — Amr Al-Dabbagh, Governor of the Saudi Arabian General Investment Authority (SAGIA), traveled to Beijing recently to discuss the development of an aluminum smelter complex in Jazan Economic City (JEC) as well as to meet with officials of Aluminum Corporation of China Ltd. (Chalco) and Malaysia-based, MMC International Holdings Limited company.

On his trip, Al-Dabbagh also met with both public and private sector leaders in China and briefed them on the benefits of investing in Jazan Economic City. He also witnessed the signing of a number of agreements between shareholders of existing JEC projects while stressing the huge role the economic city would play in the future global economy.

“We have created Jazan Economic City as a strategic business decision for Chinese companies engaged in energy intensive industries,” said Al-Dabbagh. “It’s all about increasing the efficiency with which the world’s resources are employed and people’s needs are met... So it’s no surprise that of the SR25 billion to have been invested in JEC, most of it originates from China,” he said.

The initial deal to develop and run the aluminum smelter complex was struck between MMC International Holding Ltd., Saudi Bin Ladin Group, and Chalco last year, according to previous reports. Currently CHALCO is the sole producer of alumina in China and is the second largest producer of alumina in the world.

Upon the initial agreement last year, CHALCO President Luo Jianchuan said, “This is part of our efforts to develop new Greenfield aluminum smelting capacity. The low electricity tariff within JEC will lower our production costs and enable us to offer competitively priced aluminum to serve the growing world market,” he said.

For the past several years, China has been rapidly developing and building its aluminum smelter capacity and capabilities, tripling its aluminum smelter consumption over the last decade, reaching 12 million metric tones in 2006 with forecasts of an increase by 20 percent per year.

“It’s very simple. We identified the value proposition of JEC and then identified who would be most suited to capitalize on that value proposition. The answer was China, so we reached out to Chinese business leaders in those sectors correlated to JEC’s value proposition and continue to prosperity for investors and the people of Jazan.” Al-Dabbagh said.