Egypt economy grows amid the pandemic

Egypt’s economic growth is expected to rebound strongly to 5.2 per cent in the 2021-22 fiscal year, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), almost doubling the 2.8 per cent growth for 2020-21.

President Abdel-Fattah Al-Sisi directed the government to keep up its strong economic performance in a meeting with Prime Minister Mustafa Madbouli and Minister of Finance Mohamed Maait on Sunday.

The president said that maintaining high growth rates was important to stabilise monetary and financial conditions, adding that data should be regularly updated to monitor the country’s economic development.

He recommended increasing public investment, saying that this would help to meet development needs within the framework of the Egypt Vision 2030 strategy.

Maait said during the meeting that the government had managed to boost the country’s revenues by LE119 billion, a 12.2 per cent increase, in addition to achieving a primary budget surplus of about LE93.1 billion, or 1.4 per cent of GDP.

He stressed that the budget deficit had fallen from eight per cent to 7.4 per cent of GDP, adding that Egypt had been one of the most successful countries in reducing its debt-to-GDP ratio despite the coronavirus pandemic that had led many other countries to increase their debt.