Browsing: Egypt Economy

• Egypt’s economy has recently been on life support as the national debt continued to mount.
• The investments from Saudi Arabia and further funds anticipated from the World Bank and IMF will give Egypt enough cash to meet its debt obligations and maintain stability in its recently floated currency.
• The significant official and bilateral support announced and marked policy steps that Egypt has taken will, if maintained, support macroeconomic balancing.

Egypt’s economy on life support

Egypt’s economy has recently been on life support as the national debt continued to mount. The Egyptian currency has weakened against the US dollar, with rising inflation rates close to 30 per cent, occasioning a capital flight. Moreover, the overlapping global shocks and the domestic supply of bottlenecks have adversely impacted the country’s economic activity.

Egypt has also suffered from rising global interest rates and soaring commodity prices in international markets. These overlapping factors widen the …

• Egypt has secured $250 million to aid its battered economy after the elections held in 2023.
• The country has been struggling, with the economy remaining on life support, while the regime continues to plough on with mega projects.
• Africa Finance Corporation and ITFC have a successful joint track record in Islamic finance, previously providing a $50 million loan to Egypt and a EUR 25 million loan to Senegal in November 2022.

Egypt has secured a $250 million loan from the Africa Finance Corporation (AFC) to better prepare for anticipated shocks, disruptions, or stress that the North African country may experience.

As the continent’s primary provider of infrastructure financing solutions, AFC will extend a $250 million Sharia-law-compliant trade loan to Egypt in collaboration with the International Islamic Trade Finance Corporation (ITFC), a member of the Islamic Development Bank Group.

According to a statement from IFC, the loan proceeds will contribute to …

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) expects Egypt’s tourism revenues losses to exceed 2 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP) in 2020 due to COVID-19 crisis.

A report by the IMF titled “EXTERNAL SECTOR REPORT: Global Imbalances and the COVID-19 Crisis” noted that a recent study (UN World Tourism Organization 2020) included a scenario involving a gradual lifting of travel restrictions starting in September. The scenario implies tourism receipts 73 per cent below their 2019 levels, with a direct impact on tourism trade balances ranging from –6 per cent of GDP to 2 per cent of GDP.

“During the first four months of 2020 international tourism arrivals were about 50 per cent lower than over the same period in 2019, with deeper declines for related indicators, such as international flight arrivals and hotel reservations,” IMF stated.

It also noted that the projected direct impact on tourism trade balances in 2020 …

Egypt sees a 3.2 per cent increase in its total exports to the world trade organisations member countries in 2019.

The export increased to $29.8  billion in 2019 compared to the $28.9 billion recorded in 2018. The statistics came in the Annual Bulletin of Intraregional Trade Groups 2019 by the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics (CAPMAS).

CAPMAS report covers intraregional trade organisations in which Egypt is a member state. These include the Community of Sahel-Saharan States, COMESA, the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA), the Arab Free Trade Area, the Group of 15 and the Developing Eight Islamic Countries Group (D-8).

According to the report, in 2019, Egypt recorded the largest amount of export to the Arab Free Trade Area with $10.1billion compared to $9.5 billion in 2018, an increase of 5.9 per cent. It was followed by Egypt’s export to United Nations Economic …

Egypt, one of Africa’s vibrant tourism destination, has recorded a 5.6 per cent Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in the past six months, to December 2019, Reuters said a government statement revealed the information.

Tourism has been attributed to Egypt’s economic growth in the last three years, strong remittances from Egyptian workers abroad and recently discovered natural gas fields coming on stream.

Hence, the nation’s growth has mainly been driven by the state sector. The World Bank (WB) spotlighted the nation’s economy and noted that, on the sectoral side, gas extractives, wholesale and retail trade, real estate and construction have been the main drivers of growth.

Unemployment decreased to 7.5 per cent in the fourth quarter of FY19 (from 9.9 per cent a year earlier), although accompanied by shrinking labour force participation.

According to Reuters January poll, the economy is expected to grow 5.8 per cent in the fiscal year ending …

Egypt is among the top ten emerging economies worldwide, Egypt’s Minister of Planning and Economic Development Hala Al-Saeed said on the sidelines of the UK-Africa Investment Summit 2020 in London.

Saeed claimed that now is the best time to invest in Egypt, adding that the economic reforms undertaken by the Egyptian government are what helped the country to make the list of the world’s top-ten emerging economies.

She explained that Egypt has a very large market, with 60 per cent being the youth and the whole world is looking at investment in human capital.

Saeed added that Egypt has embarked on a wide range of reforms to invest in infrastructure, such as the development of the road network and the energy and electricity sectors, as well as the development of Suez Canal Economic Zone (SCZone).

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“The Suez Canal economic zone …