Engineer/ Hassan Al Khatib, Minister of Investment and Foreign Trade, reviews before the Senate Plenary Session, the state's policies that aspire to support the investors and facilitate Foreign Trade movement to Egypt, and also the Ministry's efforts for attracting more investments and increasing the Egyptian exports to foreign markets.
This came during the Senate plenary session headed by Counselor Abdel-Wahab Abdel-Razek, and attended by Engineer Essam El-Naggar, Chairman of the General Organization for Export and Import Control, during review of the joint committee report, from the Committee on Industry, Trade, and Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises, the Committee on Constitutional and Legislative Affairs and the Committee on Financial, Economic and Investment Affairs, with respect to the draft law submitted by the government and referred by the House of Representatives regarding amending some provisions of Law No. 121 of 1982 on the Importers’ Register 2024.
Al-Khatib indicated that the State has a developed infrastructure and new cities, and the Egyptian market is also characterized by qualified workers. Egypt is a huge consumer market and enjoys a strategic geographical location in the middle of the continents of the world, that facilitates access to countries in the Middle East and continents of Europe, Africa and Asia.
He pointed out that the Egyptian market has unique investment potentials and opportunities that make it an attractive destination for domestic and foreign investments, referring to the increasing demand for new companies that have already begun accessing and investing in the Egyptian market, driven by diverse investment opportunities and huge growth potentials, stressing that the Egyptian market has many investment potentials and capabilities that include the availability of renewable energy sources, and their relation to free and preferential trade agreements with more than 70 countries, and also the availability of a large number of investment incentives.
He added that the Ministry creates, during the current stage, a flexible and stable economic environment, and an investment climate characterized by transparency and competitiveness, indicating the current trend of the state to empower the private sector as it is the primary driver of the economic development system.
He stressed that the state supports the localization of domestic industry through the procedures related to protecting such industry from harmful commercial practices, developing and supporting it, deemed as the backbone of the national economy, in addition to giving the private sector a pivotal role in steering the economy. The state also plays the role of controller and regulator to ensure a fair and transparent investment environment.
Regarding the Sovereign Fund, the minister indicated that the fund aims at maximizing the return on the State's assets, to reflect the true value of the Egyptian economy, reviving the national brands, building a strong identity, enhancing its competitiveness, and increasing its value. He demonstrates that the Ministry provides, during the current stage, a suitable investment climate through providing the supportive institutional and legislative environment, simplifying the procedures and overcoming obstacles that face investors. He said that the ministry is in the process of implementing more reforms to the financial, monetary, commercial and procedural policies with the aim of providing more facilities to investors and facilitating Egypt's foreign trade movement.
Al-Khatib noted that an ambitious plan has been drawn up to gradually reduce the customs release time to reach two days by 2025. The plan is based upon two stages; first stage aims to reduce the release period to reach (4) days, which enhances the efficiency of customs operations, while the second stage aims to reach only two days. This enhances commercial competitiveness and significantly reduces logistical costs, which positively reflects on the business environment and saves huge costs on the economy.
The Minister denoted that the government has developed clear and motivating policies for the investment and trade to alleviate the procedural and non-tax financial burdens on investors, whereas a plan has been developed to implement these policies in two stages. The first (current) stage includes addressing the most prominent financial deductions applied to companies on a periodical basis as the fund percentage of financing training and rehabilitation was reduced from 1% of profits to 0.25% of the minimum insurance wage, along with addressing the retroactive effect in coordination with the Ministry of Labor, and amending the tax on solidarity contribution to be calculated on profits instead of revenues, and the coordination is currently conducted with all concerned authorities in this regard. He pointing out that the second stage will focus on analyzing each sector separately in coordination with all entities.
The Minister also noted that these policies and reforms will contribute to making Egypt’s trade policy open to the world, and increasing Egyptian exports to foreign markets, as well as providing an attractive environment for the domestic industry and supporting its competitiveness, indicating that these policies and reforms will also contribute to placing Egypt at an advanced stage in global trade indicators to be among the 50 largest countries in the world during the coming period, and consequently moving to the top twenty positions by 2030 while achieving a qualitative leap in exports.
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