Egypt, UK envision stronger South-South, triangular cooperation for climate technologies and green hydrogen

Cairo - 11 March 2022: Reflecting the growing recognition of the potential for South-South cooperation and triangular cooperation to facilitate technology development and transfer for climate action in developing countries, the Minister of International Cooperation, Rania A. Al-Mashat held a meeting with the United Kingdom’s Minister of State Foreign Commonwealth and Development Affairs, Lord Tariq Ahmad of Wimbledon, where they discussed Egypt’s economic reform, COP27, and how the UK and Egypt can work closer together to deliver for both countries.

Pursuing a win-win approach in all partnerships, the Minister highlighted Egypt’s keenness to deepen cooperation with the United Kingdom through triangular cooperation and South-South cooperation, which is essential to present good practices in climate technology for Africa.

The Minister underscoredthe value of the bilateral economic partnership between Egypt and the United Kingdom, which is reflected in the positive results that have had an impact on Egypt’s economy.

A joint statement was issued to strengthen economic cooperation between the two countries in 2020 within the activities of the British-African Investment Summit, where the United Kingdom expressed willingness to strengthen bilateral and multilateral partnerships with development partners, governments, policy makers, the private sector and civil society to achieve sustainable development.

The Minister added that the United Kingdom has renewed its strong cooperation with Egypt by providing various forms of technical and economic support, such as funding agricultural value chains projects, along with providing technical support for the central administration of public-private partnerships at the Ministry of Finance.

In the same vein, she hailed the efforts of the United Kingdom in organizing the COP26 summit in Glasgow, which witnessed an impressive participation by the Egyptian delegation. The Ministry of International Cooperation hosted an event titled "Going Green: Developing an International Framework For Innovative Climate Financing" in partnership with the Ministry of Environment to discuss adopting innovative solutions to climate action, such as blended finance and green finance tools to close the climate funding gap.

Attended by representatives from government officials in Africa, multilateral banks and international financial institutions, the session proposed new and innovative financing tools that need to be adopted, such as risk reduction tools and blended financing, and to develop long-term strategies to support climate action.

To support climate action at scale by providing practical ways to help emerging economies finance and deliver their climate commitments under the Paris Agreement, the Minister discussed the framework of cooperation with the United Kingdom through the Climate Finance Accelerator (CFA), in which the United Kingdom is working helping to identify challenges and blockages that prevent finance from flowing at the volume and speed required to have a meaningful impact on their climate ambitions.

Egypt is scheduled to take part in building capacities and identifying projects, which will be discussed and presented to obtain the country’s required financing needs.

During the meeting, the Minister referred to the ambitious reforms that are implemented by Egypt in renewable energy by launching the sustainable energy strategy 2035, through which it aims to increase renewable energy in the generated energy mix to reach 42% by 2035. Regarded as a model for inclusive partnerships, one of the projects that are funded by development partners, with the participation of the government and the private sector, is the Benban Solar park, the largest solar park in the region and one of the largest in the world.

The Minister added that Egypt is deepening its commitment to inclusive growth, which has been mainstreamed across all partnership strategies. Egypt recently launched the first phase of the ‘Decent Life’ (Haya Karima) initiative, which aims to raise the living standards of 58 million Egyptians in more than 4,000 villages over three years at a cost of more than EGP 700 billion (about $44.6 billion).

The Minister highlighted in the meeting that Egypt pursues a win-win approach in all partnerships, as it aims to achieve complementarities and to share Egypt’s experience in development financing to other countries through South-South and triangular cooperation.

These partnerships are reflected in the 2021 Annual report launched by the Ministry, "Engaging for Impact Towards Our Common Future", which is based on the inclusive-green-digital nexus. Total funding from multilateral and bilateral development partners in 2021 amounted to $20 billion over the two years, despite the circumstances imposed by the pandemic.