CAIRO: Revenue from Egypt’s Suez Canal rose 16.3 percent year on year in February but fell from January, the canal authority’s website showed on Friday.
Many canal employees were on strike throughout the month as the protests that ousted the government of Hosni Mubarak spread across the country, but officials said traffic in the waterway was unaffected.
The canal is a vital source of foreign currency in Egypt, along with tourism, oil and gas exports and remittances from Egyptians living abroad.
Revenue rose to $388.7 million from $334.1 million in February 2010 but fell from $416.6 million in January 2011.
Analysts say February is traditionally slow because of a seasonal decline in non-oil traffic.
On a monthly basis, receipts fell 6.7 percent from the $416.6 million earned in January 2011.
In its daily market report, Beltone Financial said that the monthly fall in revenues is seasonal, not linked with the current political events occurring in Egypt.
“Traffic in the Suez Canal usually weakens in January, and more notably, February every year, before rebounding once again in March,” Beltone said, adding that the impact of the current political events in Egypt on the Suez Canal is marginal, “with the military and government continuing to ensure its smooth operation.”
Suez Canal monthly earnings have been rising since the beginning of 2010, and are “well on the way to our forecast level of $5 billion for FY2010/11, signaling the continued recovery in global trade.”
The investment bank recommended that the Suez Canal Authority continue focusing on extending passing vessels with incentives and discounts to increase traffic, “rather than resorting to increasing transit fees, until a more sustainable pace of global economic recovery and trade movement is seen.”
The SCA left transit fees unchanged until the end of 2011. –Additional reporting by Daily News Egypt.
