Hawzah News Agency-Plans to establish the world’s first Islamic venture capital fund are in the final stage and it will be launched at the right time, said Treasury Secretary-General Tan Sri Irwan Serigar Abdullah.

He said teams from the ministry and Islamic Development Bank (IDB) met twice to finalize the structure of the fund, spearheaded by Malaysia in collaboration with the IDB.

“Now it is a matter of waiting for the right time to announce, launch and go-to-market,” he told reporters after a briefing on the 11th International Conference On Islamic Economics and Finance (11th ICIEF) yesterday.

Also present was IDB director-general Prof Datuk Dr Mohd Azmi Omar.

Irwan Serigar said Malaysia is in talks for Indonesia to join the venture capital fund, which will have an initial size of US$100 million (RM411 million).

He said even without Indonesia’s participation, Malaysia will still go ahead with the fund with IDB and Malaysia Venture Capital Management Bhd.

The fund will be used to finance start-up companies not only in Malaysia but also in the region and other Islamic countries.

Irwan Siregar said the 11th ICIEF will bring together academicians and Islamic finance practitioners from 35 countries. “We have a lot of waqf land and farm but it is not fully utilized. I hope this conference can be a platform to discuss on how to take our waqf programme and innitiative to the next level.”

The event, themed "Rethinking Islamic Economic and Finance: Paving the Way Forward for Inclusive and Sustainable Development", will be held on Oct 11-13 in Kuala Lumpur.