EBRD’s investments in Egypt to double to €1.5B by year-end

CAIRO – 14 November 2017: The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development’s (EBRD) investment portfolio in Egypt is expected to skyrocket to €1.5 billion ($1.7 billion) by the year’s end, which is more than double of last year’s figure, EBRD’s Managing Director for the southern and eastern Mediterranean (SEMED) region Janet Heckman told Egypt Today Tuesday.

“Since the beginning of 2017, the EBRD has invested around €1.3 billion in Egypt in different sectors, of which 30 percent [were allocated] for public sector entities in areas [such as] transport, renewable energy, waste water, energy efficiency,” Heckman said in an interview on the sidelines of the EBRD regional business form held in Cairo Tuesday.

However, most of the EBRD work is in the private sector and “we are also doing a lot of work with the manufacturing and services’ sector this year,” she added.

“Egypt will be one of the top two countries of investment this year among all the countries where the EBRD is operating,” Heckman said.

Praising the economic reform program initiated last year, the EBRD senior official said: “The reform policies of the government over the past 18 months – cutting subsidies, floating the pound, issuing the New Investment Law, the Bankruptcy Law, and introducing the value added tax – these all helped investments which will definitely boost sustainable growth and creating jobs.”

Egypt is a founding member of the EBRD and has been receiving investments by the Bank since 2012. To date, the Bank has invested €2.7 billion in 52 projects in the country.

The EBRD’s areas of investment include the financial sector, agribusiness, manufacturing and services, as well as infrastructure projects such as power, municipal water and wastewater services, and support for transport services. The EBRD has also provided technical assistance to more than 600 SMEs in the country so far.