Egypt Eyes 4.3% Growth Rate In FY 2012/13: Hesham Kandil

The Egyptian Prime Minister Hesham Kandil has inaugurated the Euromoney Conference today in Cairo where top businessmen and economists in Egypt and the world attend.

Kandil said in his opening speech that the Egyptian government has set a strategy which targets growth rate of 4.3% in FY 2012/2013 in order to provide about 700,000 job opportunities.

The government focuses on small and medium enterprises (SMEs) in order to achieve growth rate of more than 7% in the next five years. Such target will be fulfilled through increasing the market share of SMEs to 30% and link them to the large enterprises, he noted.

The government succeeded in signing an agreement worth US$ 400 million and another agreement worth €400 million to develop SMEs. Regaining Egypt’s investment position will be attained through clearing ambiguities and encouraging investors by creating an attractive environment for investment, he affirmed.

The Egyptian political scene has begun to recover after the frequent foreign visits of Mohamed Morsi to many countries, Kandil noted, referring to the Egyptian president’s recent visit to Uganda in which he works to foster the relationship between Egypt and African countries.

The government aims at deepening the relationship between Egypt and a number of countries such as Sudan through establishing a road linking between Cairo and Khartoum in order to facilitate the transport of people and goods, in addition to a road linking between Alexandria and Addis Ababa, he continued.

These plans came as part of the government’s strategy aiming at attracting new investors to the Egyptian market as the country eyes attracting investments worth EGP 276 million during this year.