Tarek Kabil, Minister of Trade and Industry, announced on Thursday that 226 industrial projects have received approvals during the month of January, with total investments worth EGP 8bn, compared to 180 projects with total investments of EGP 3bn during the same period in 2016.
Moreover, the new projects are spread among different industrial sectors—71 are for the food manufacturing sector, 44 for chemical engineering, 33 for textiles, and the remaining projects are distributed among mining and pharmaceuticals.
Kabil said that these positive indicators reflect the ministry’s strategy to promote industrial development until 2020, along with adopting new strategies to encourage industrial production activities in promising industrial sectors in order to raise the industrial growth rate to 8% and increase its contribution to the total GDP by 21% instead of 17.7%.
He added that the ministry has launched the first phase of the investment map, which includes the available investment opportunities in some provinces, stressing that this map will increase industrial investment rates during the next period, since they are based on accurate information about the supplementary industry projects needed by the industries to replace imports.
The ministry is prioritising the development of the micro, small, and medium enterprises sector, as well as an engine for development and creativity, said Kabil. He pointed out that the new strategy is to transform small and medium enterprises and entrepreneurship as the corner stone for increasing Egypt’s industrial output, employment, and exports, adding that Egypt’s 2.5 million micro, small and medium-sized enterprises employ 75% of the total workforce, while 17% of them export abroad.
