The agreement between Farmtrac and Ghanaian government aims to accelerate Ghana's rural development and its move towards the food sovereignty, a strategic element of the policy adopted by its Ministry of Agriculture. Under the agreement, the Polish company will also offer the development of the service network and provide an intensive training of technical staff in Ghana.

Opta-Tech donated a set of diagnostic and research equipment including microscopes to help local medical universities to improve the quality of medical education. The equipment is designed for both teaching and for conducting clinical tests in such areas of microbiology as histopathology, and blood and urine tests. Due to its versatility, the medical equipment from Poland is an excellent tool for the diagnosis of malaria and tuberculosis under the standards of WHO. (Opta-tech/Farmtrac)

Września and Nowa Ruda will be covered by Wałbrzych SEZ. As a result, new investments in Lower Silesia and Wielkopolska will be implemented that should deliver over 10,000 new jobs within the zone over the next few years. Investment expenditure in the new plots are expected to exceed PLN 4.5 billion. (www.premier.gov.pl)

Polish food company Dino will spend PLN 50m on building a cooling hall and associated infrastructure in Krotoszyn. The investor plans to hire 250 employees. Dino will provide meat processing and preparation of ready meals there. In addition, the company will launch spice-mix room and a computer-controlled line for baking bread.

The second investment will be located in Września by Krispol that will build a plant of components for sectional doors and garage doors. The investment will cost PLN 20m. At least 10 new people will find work there.

Meanwhile, Faurecia will implement two investments in the zone. Its factories producing car-seat parts and foam filling in Wałbrzych and Jelcz-Laskowice will be expanded. The total value of both investments provided by the French company has already reached nearly PLN 70m. Faurecia plans to create more than 120 new jobs.

Jelcz-Laskowice will also host an investment from Elica Group Poland; the company will invest PLN 10m to develop a factory for cooker hoods. 30 people will find work there. (WSEZ)

PXM is a professional manufacturer of lighting systems for theatres, museums, buildings and gardens. The company offers a whole range of innovative solutions in architectural lighting, LED lamps and fountain pumps.

The investor will spend PLN 5.8m and employ at least 10 new employees. (KTP)

This year sees several great anniversaries. Exactly 25 years ago, Poland entered the path of democratic changes that led the country to join NATO and the European Union. At that time, Poland opened its doors for foreign investors. Who were the first foreign investors in Poland? What were the first state-owned companies to be privatised in the 90s? What are the common experiences of Poland and its CEE neighbours in encouraging foreign investments? Those are the highlights of the panel discussion dedicated to the 25 years of foreign investment in Poland moderated by PAIiIZ president Sławomir Majman. The panellists will try to sum up this period and to look at the future of FDI in Poland.

On the next day, Mr Majman will lead the 3rd EU-China Economic Cooperation Forum, during which the growing role of China in the global economy, new trends in Chinese investments and trade as well as the potential of the Chinese internal market will be discussed. The panellists will talk about China's policy towards the EU and Eastern Europe. The event begins at 9:30 am in Altus building, with the speech of deputy minister and editor-in-chief of the Chinese People's Daily. Among the invited guests will be representatives of the governments and institutions from Poland, the Czech Republic, China and the EU.

Both events are co-organised by PAIiIZ as part of the VI European Economic Congress in Katowice. (PAIiIZ)

More information: www.paiz.gov.pl/20140507/eec_in_katowice

The seminar is co-organised by the British Polish Chamber of Commerce and PAIiIZ. PwC and Astra Zeneca are partners of the events. There will be presentations of best practice in terms of commercialising ideas from universities from the UK and other EU member states. To register, please complete the form: www.paiz.gov.pl/Poland_for_RandD_Warsaw - Monday 28 April (14:00-18:00).

More: www.paiz.gov.pl/20140424/polands_potential_as_a_country_for_locating_corporate_RD. (PAIiIZ/BPCC)

The programme consists of B2B talks between Polish entrepreneurs and Chinese companies. The guests from China will represent the following sectors: construction, real estate, electronics, refrigeration equipment, logistics, warehousing, processing and production of steel, decoration, energy, IT, wood, non-ferrous metals, automotive parts, textiles, footwear, biotechnology, health products, health food, cosmetics, electromagnetic devices.

Registration is available online by 24 April: www.gochina.gov.pl/Qingdao.

More information: www.paiz.gov.pl/20140505/meeting_with_chinese_business_from_qingdao. (PAIiIZ)

Participants will discuss investment opportunities in Poland and Luxembourg in the clean technology, logistics, space technology sectors. They will also look at communication links between the two countries.

Registration is available by email: www.paiz.gov.pl/Poland-Luxembourg until 2 May. (PAIiIZ)

The Forum's programme includes sessions of individual business meetings between Polish and Chinese entrepreneurs from Zhejiang.

Companies interested in participating should register by 20 April: www.gochina.gov.pl/Zhejiang_forum.

The China Council for the Promotion of International Trade (CCPIT), PAIiIZ and the Embassy of China are the organisers of the Forum.

More information: www.paiz.gov.pl/20140527/zhejiang_poland_matchmaking_forum. (PAIiIZ)

PAIiIZ is the honorary patron of the 5th ABSL Conference that will take place in Poznań on 22-24 May. Madeleine Albright, former US Secretary of State will be the guest of honour of the event.

The main theme of the 5th ABSL Conference will be "Poland - taking on the world!". Participants of the event will discuss about all aspects of business decision-making.

More informations: www.absl.pl/pl/conference-2014. (Linkleaders)

During the two-day meeting, participants will be provided with case studies, prepared by the heads of HR in key automotive companies operating in Poland.

The meeting has been arranged by AutomotiveSuppliers.pl. PAIiIZ is the patron of the event PAIiIZ.

More information: www.hrwmotoryzacji.pl. (AutomotiveSuppliers.pl)

The event is dedicated to promoting medical treatment abroad, as an option for those who can not afford to use the health care system in the UK or want to use medical services outside the country.

Last year's show was visited by 10,000 visitors. The event brings together representatives of medical institutions, spa towns, medical doctors of various specialities, medical agents representatives of medical tourism, as well as tourist agencies and hotels.

Companies interested in participating in the Polish exhibition stand should contact karolina.dresler@paiz.gov.pl.

More information: www.paiz.gov.pl/20140710/health_tourism_show_en. (PAIiIZ)

Currently, there is a huge gap in the access to internet - only 2.7 billion people in the world are connected to internet while the 4.3 billion remain unconnected. The unconnected are typically world’s poorest and most disadvantaged populations. In the developed countries, internet penetration reaches 74% (68% in Europe and 82% in North America). In Poland, the access to the global network is slightly lower, reaching about 60%.

In contrast, the internet penetration in developing countries remains at the very low level of 22%, which means that only 800 million out of 3.8 billion people can use it. The worst situation has been recorded in India - only 13% of the country’s population has the access to internet. Africa and South East Asia both have about 20% of internet penetration, while Latin America remains the leader of the group with the 45% of its population connected to the global network.

Deloitte argues that if the level of internet penetration in the developing countries was the same as in the developed countries, the productivity of those markets would grow to the average level of 25% and the number of internet users will increase to 3 billion. Moreover, at least 44 million new jobs could be created in Africa and nearly 65 million in India. (Deloitte)

2013 was the second year in the row of the constant increase of exports of Polish confectionery (including salt snacks). The value of exports reached over PLN 6.3 billion last year. At the same time, the value of the domestic market was PLN 12.7 billion. The growing number of discounters is a key trend that will shape the development of the Polish confectionery market. In 2013, those shops generated nearly 40% of the total sale of sweets in Poland. The EU countries, Russia, the US, Turkey and Saudi Arabia are the main destinations for Polish confectionery’s exports. According to Eurostat, the total value of exports increased by 72% in 2009-2013. Only in 2013, the exports increased by 12.9% in terms of volume of goods. In terms of the value of confectionery, the exports grew by 15.6%, compared with the previous year.

Source: djul-Fotolia.com

Chocolate and confectionery industry in Poland is one of the most modern and fastest-growing industries in the food sector. For years, Polish confectionery products have played a major role in the country's exports of processed foods. The most important and also the fastest growing segment of the Polish confectionery market are chocolate products. In 2013 this segment has a 50% share of the market. It is expected that the value of the segment will increase by over 17% by 2018, while at the same time the total confectionery market will grow only by 9%. (KPMG)

Innovative companies are paying more attention to the quality of management, HR development, professional marketing, transparent finance policy, production efficiency and generally are more likely to achieve economic success. It means that innovation will lead to overall improvement in companies' functioning and increase their opportunities for expansion.

Every year, Deloitte-Central Europe surveys the motivation of companies to engage in R&D activities. This year the survey will be conducted among companies from Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Hungary.

Deloitte has established the BERD index (Business Expenditure on Research & Development) that provides information about companies' needs and factors stimulating the increase of expenditure on R&D projects.

The survey questionnaire is available on: www.deloitte.com/pl/R&DCESurveyEN.

Every participant of the survey will get the whole version of the report as well as the publication on innovations. (Deloitte)

Participants of RobotChallenge competed in 15 categories. The Poles won gold in four categories: mini-sumo and humanoid sumo fighting robots, puck-collecting and humanoid sprint competition.

Success in Vienna is not the only one recent achievement of robot designers from Poland. Poles also won awards in the prestigious University Rover Challenge in the US. (www.poland.gov.pl)