Egypt to subsidize air travel to lure tourists from Europe

Egyptian’s Ministry of Tourism has unveiled on Monday a plan to subsidize air flights from London and Paris to Luxor and Aswan in the next five months.According to Adla Ragab, the ministry’s economic advisor, the value of the subsidy has been set at EGP 1,000 (1US$= 7.15 EGP) within a plan to subsidize tourist flow to Upper Egypt.

Ragab explained that flights from London in the last period were almost complete at 80 percent of normal rates, and the ministry hopes to soon increase the rate to 100 percent.

She declared that the ministry is looking into whether to subsidize vacant seats of chartered flights from Russia or to subsidize flights in the Egyptian airports.