investment minister, Ashraf Salman, said on Monday that the country expects to attract $8 billion of foreign direct investment in the current fiscal year, double of the $4 billion it achieved last year.
Salman, speaking at a business conference in Dubai, reiterated that the government aims to cut its budget deficit to 10 percent of GDP in the current year from 15 percent the previous year.
Egypt’s economy has been battered by political turmoil since a 2011 uprising toppled long-time leader Hosni Mubarak in 2011, but it is now showing signs of a rebound. Current President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, has pledged to get the economy back on track and lure back investors by creating a more business-friendly climate. Salman said the government will issue a $1.5 billion sovereign bond by June – its first Eurobond issue after a five-year gap caused by political and economic instability – and then another sovereign bond issue in September.
Vote of Confidence for Egypt
In recent times, several investors have been putting money into Egypt, a vote of confidence for the country’s political stability. GB Auto, Egypt’s biggest vehicle company, said in January it will invest $1.5 billion to build two new factories.
Chief Executive Raouf Ghabbour, who announced the company’s plans, said he was confident about investing in Egypt because of its stable political situation. “Our investment decisions are going to be much easier going forward,” he told Reuters in an interview on Tuesday. “We are looking at a big wave of investments,” said the CEO, adding that the firm was looking at building the new factories in the next 3-4 years.
Swiss food group Nestle, also announced in the same month that it will inject $137 million in Egypt in the next couple of years. Food is a fast-growing economic sector in Egypt, the most populous Arab nation with 90 million people.“Certainly the kind of investments we have made over the last three to four years are the kind of vision that we would have for this market also going forward,” Suresh Narayanan, CEO of Nestle’s North East Africa Region told Reuters. He added then that the company believed the North African country’s economic changes had the potential to deliver the goods.
