Fitch Solutions commends positive performance of Egypt's consumer sector despite coronavirus

CAIRO – 31 August 2021: Egypt’s Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly reviewed a report prepared by the Information and Decision Support Center at the Presidency of the Council of Ministers, which monitors what Fitch Solutions issued this August about growth prospects in the Middle East and North Africa region.

Osama El-Gohary, Assistant to the Prime Minister and Acting Head of the Center, said that Fitch Agency praised in its report the positive performance of the consumer sector in Egypt, according to a statement issued by the Council of Ministers on Tuesday.

According to the statement, the agency praised the uniqueness of the sector in Egypt regionally and internationally in achieving strong performance during and after the Corona virus pandemic in a case described by the agency as a rare occurrence; Especially since the real spending of families in the majority of global markets was negatively affected as a natural result of the pandemic, and these are the markets in which many of them have a vaccine path that is moving at much faster rates than the Egyptian rates.

El-Gohary added that the agency indicated that the recovery of this sector in particular takes 2-3 years; While in the Egyptian case, it witnessed resilience during the pandemic, and strong performance after the pandemic, according to its estimates, household consumer spending during 2021 increased by 15 percent from its pre-pandemic level during 2019, and it is expected to increase by (21 percent) during 2022 compared to 2019.

Fitch Solutions indicated in its report that the strong performance of the consumer sector in Egypt is due to some implemented government policies related to supporting groups affected by the Corona virus pandemic, in addition to the flow of remittances from workers abroad, relative control of inflation and an expansionary monetary policy that supports the purchasing power of families.