Report Analysis and Discussion
Al Jazeera: What are the direct and indirect economic impact of US visa obstacles in the Arab world?
IRmep: In this first detailed study we have estimated approximately $101 billion dollars in losses to manufacturing industries in the US. Losses for travel and tourism are approximately $1.8 billion. Higher education, which is not usually considered a service export, has had losses of around $2 billion which is equivalent to 9,000 jobs. This is problematic because the Arab market is extremely attractive to the United States. It has grown in terms of import demand from approximately $170 billion at the beginning of this century, or rather, the year 2000, to over $345 billion dollars estimated for this year. So as the US “locks out” industrial and commercial buyers, along with the students and tourists, the losses are mounting.”
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