Amman - Gulf-region investors might be attracted to put their money into Jordan as they withdraw investments from increasingly shaky Western markets, the head of Jordan's state-run investment agency said Tuesday.

"Jordan has a good opportunity to gain from the new flow of Gulf investments as a result of the world financial crisis," said Maan Ensour, CEO of the state-run Investment Promotion Corporation (IPC), in an interview with the official Petra news agency.

However, he said that the volume of new Gulf funds coming to Jordan would depend on the success of the authorities in ensuring "safe haven to these investments and providing investors with well- considered projects."

Arab and foreign experts believe investments from sovereign wealth funds and private sector interests from the six member states of the Gulf Cooperation Council lost at least 1 trillion dollars in the global financial meltdown that swept the world starting in September. Estimates place about 3 trillion dollars of Gulf-region money invested in Western banks before the turmoil took off.

Gulf investments in Jordan stood at more than 15 billion dollars at the end of 2008, Ensour said Tuesday. Most foreign funds invested in Jordan came from oil-rich Gulf countries, he added.

Ensour said that the next Gulf investments in Jordan would likely be a Qatari fund with capital of two billion dollars.

"We are in the process of conducting thorough feasibility studies for the Qatari projects, which are due to cover vital sectors like agriculture, petrochemicals, energy, information technology, mining, pharmaceuticals and tourism," he added.

However, he said that Jordanian departments involved should get rid of certain shortcomings to speed up the approval of developments projects.

"There is also a bad need for the enactment of a new investment law to cope with the increasing economic challenges and the fierce competition currently witnessed by the region and the world at large," Ensour said. (dpa)