Egypt’s Minister of International Cooperation Rania Al-Mashat and the Mission Director for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) in Egypt, Sherry Carlin, have agreed to partner in five forthcoming projects worth total investments of $105m.
The five projects are in the areas of economic and social support for women, empowerment of girls, economic governance, digitising government services, moving to the New Administrative Capital, economic courts, and developing Egypt’s neediest governorates.
During the online meeting, the two sides also discussed a new cooperation strategy between the ministry and USAID over the next five years.
The minister noted that the Egyptian government and USAID have a strategic partnership in a number of development projects in sectors including health, education, women’s economic empowerment, and agriculture.
Minister Al-Mashat stressed her ministry’s keenness to coordinate with USAID on the new cooperation strategy between Egypt and the US. The strategy corresponds to Egypt’s development priorities and sustainable development goals (SDGs).
The Ministry of International Cooperation’s new strategy is to create international partnerships based on three main axes, namely keeping the citizen as the focus of attention, ongoing projects, and the goal being the driving force.
The current total joint portfolio between Egypt and USAID amounts to about $1bn through bilateral agreements in sectors including agriculture, basic education, higher education, health, and tourism. The two sides also have joint projects in trade and investment, water and sanitation, small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and women’s empowerment. The Egyptian American Business Fund is also involved in supporting SMEs in Egypt.
