Health, education allocations in new budget meet constitution requirement

CAIRO – 5 May 2018: Allocations for health and education sectors did not see a reduction in the new budget for fiscal year 2018/19, Head of the Finance Ministry’s State Budget Sector Mohamed Abdel Fatah said on Saturday.

He said that allocations for both fields are meeting the constitution requirement, saying that allocations for the health and pre-university education sectors in the new budget are valued at LE 81 billion and LE 88.7 billion respectively.

Abdel Fatah added that spending on social protection in the new budget is set at LE 332 billion.

Egypt’s 2018/19 budget is currently up for discussion in the Parliament. The new budget targets a GDP growth of 5.8 percent, up from 5.2 percent in the current fiscal year, expenditure of LE 1.41 trillion and investment worth LE100 billion, up from LE70 billion in the current budget.

While the new budget will see a 15.5 percent increase in expenditure, it also seeks to increase revenues by 22 per cent. The new budget targets reducing the unemployment rate to 11 percent.

Egypt embarked on a reform program that included cutting energy subsidies and introducing new taxes in order to cut budget deficit.

A fresh round of energy subsidy cuts is expected with the start of the new fiscal year in July.