Egypt’s Minister of Trade and Industry Nevine Gamea has revealed that the country’s industrial sector achieved a growth rate of 6.3% in fiscal year (FY) 2019/20.
Gamea said that Egypt’s industrial production contribution to GDP registered approximately 17.1% compared to 16.4% in FY 2018/19.
The minister added that the value of industrial production amounted to about EGP 942bn, compared to EGP 847bn in the previous FY, reflecting an increase of EGP 95bn.
She said that the value of public industrial investments amounted to about EGP 49bn during FY 2019/20, representing about 10.3% of the total public investments. Furthermore, the industrial sector also contributed to providing thousands of job opportunities during 2020, despite the difficult circumstances and challenges the global economy faced due to the novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
Gamea said that Egypt’s industrial sector accounted for nearly 28.2% of the country’s total employment. This was positively reflected in the 10.1% decrease in the country’s unemployment rate over 2020, compared to 13.1% in 2015.
The minister also announced several achievements, decisions, and procedures to develop the country’s industrial sector. These include cutting the selling prices of electricity supplied to industrial entities on the extra, high and medium voltages outside and during peak times by ten piasters per kilowatt per hour.
Additionally to this, seven new industrial complexes with a total of 1,657 units, located in different governorates across Egypt, will be offered. These complexes offer opportunities for companies working in the engineering, food, chemical, and textiles industries, as well as in those manufacturing building materials, ready-made clothes and plastics.
This comes in addition to the 1,404 new factories that have started actual production, at an investment cost of EGP 357m, and which provide 281,000 job opportunities.
The minister further explained that the Ministry of Trade and Industry has offered 14.757m sqm of industrial lands in 13 industrial zones through the industrial investment map.
The incentive has been offered via the ministry’s website, and will grant 11,597 operating licences for industrial facilities in 2020.
She further mentioned that the most important decrees issued to boost industrial production and investments, such as Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly’s decree to form a committee for the preference of Egyptian industrial product.
In addition to this, a ministerial decision has been undertaken to amend some provisions of Ministerial Resolution No. 186/1978 in the executive regulations of Law No. 24/1977 regarding the industrial registry.
A further ministerial decision has been undertaken to unify and reduce the price of natural gas for industrial activities to $4.5 per MBtu.
