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Apart from Malaysia, the fund will also target other Southeast Asian and Islamic countries

Malaysia’s Ministry of Finance Treasury Secretary-General Tan Sri Mohd. Irwan Serigar Abdullah announced that the Malaysian government and the Malaysia Venture Capital Management Bhd (MAVCAP) are going to sign an MoU with Islamic Development Bank (IDB) to mark the founding of the world’s first Islamic Venture Capital.

The MOU signing will be conducted in Jakarta this month, with US$100 million-worth of initial fund size, according to a report by The Star.

“Our team from the Finance Ministry and MAVCAP is currently at the IDB’s headquarters in Jeddah, to discuss the final touches to details of the MoU,” Abdullah said.

The fund would be utilised to finance startups in Malaysia, the Southeast Asian region and other Islamic countries.

Also Read: Halal travel booking platform Tripfez is blessed with US$750K seed led by Gobi Partners, Intres Capital

According to Abdullah, with exception of Malaysia and Indonesia, Islamic countries were a bit behind in the startup environment and the MoU is a good avenue for knowledge-sharing among concerned parties.

“The establishment of the Islamic Venture Capital has also the potential to raise the country’s per capita income,” he added.

The MoU came in the time when the halal market is facing a rapid growth, as over 23 per cent of the world’s population identifies as Muslims.

In the travel and tourism sectors alone, Muslim travellers accounted for US$142 billion in global outbound tourism revenue in 2014 and this figure is expected to rise to US$233 billion by 2020.

In the e-commerce sector, Malaysia had seen the rise of various e-commerce platforms dedicated to halal products, such as Aladdin Street and Zilzar.

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Image Credit: Darrell Chaddock on Unsplash

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