Planning Minister participates in a workshop to Support 50 Egyptian Companies to Enter Africa’s Markets

Egypt’s Minister of Planning Dr. Hala El-Said participated on Thursday in the closing ceremony of the first program to train exporters, entitled "Entering into African Markets", in cooperation between the International Islamic Trade Finance Corporation and the Egyptian Export Development Authority, in the presence of Mrs. Nevin Gamea, Minister of Trade and Industry, and Eng. Hani Sonbol, CEO of the International Islamic Corporation to finance trade.


During her speech, H.E. Dr. Hala El Said underscored the value of the Exporters Training Program entitled Entering African Markets, which comes under the umbrella of the Arab Africa Trade Bridges Program, which in turn aims to enhance trade and investment flows between Arab and African countries and maximize promising economic opportunities. She added that this comes within a framework of a strategy aimed at enhancing the efficiency of public and private institutions in trade, with the establishment of a virtual platform to strengthen the interlinkage between trade support institutions, policymakers, and other participants in the field of international trade.

 El-Said added that this is the first program to train Egyptian exporters on tangible mechanisms to access African markets, benefiting marketing managers and representatives from 50 companies from the targeted exporting sectors in many fields.


 El-Said stressed that the program aligns with the objectives of the National Structural Reform Program, which aims to boost the Egyptian economy, localize technology, raise the competitiveness of Egyptian exports, enhance sectors capable of penetrating foreign markets, raise export rates, and diversify exported goods, products and services. 


On top of that, she explained that the deepening of cooperation with ITFC builds on a successful and historic partnership that included many important programs that are already being implemented, most notably the Aid for Trade Initiative for Arab States (AfTIAS) program and the She Trades Egypt project, which aims to support women’s economic empowerment and contribute to comprehensive and sustainable development. 

Dr. Hala El Said pointed out that discussions with Eng. Hani Salem Sonbol, CEO ITFC, included reviewing the implementation of an additional number of important programs, most notably the creation of a virtual trade portal mapping producers and exporters to provide them with their targeted needs and allow them to rely on national products to bolster local supply chains. 


El-Said added that all of these programs come within the framework of fruitful cooperation with the corporation and its remarkable development contribution, which has so far resulted in a cooperation portfolio worth about $12.5 billion.

 El-Said referred to the existing cooperation between Egypt and the ITFC through the General Authority for Supply Commodities and the Egyptian General Petroleum Corporation to enhance their ability to mitigate the economic repercussions of the pandemic, undermining Egypt's keenness to deepen cooperation with international development partners from all regional and international financing institutions.


Egypt had officially joined the Arab-African Trade Bridges Program and became a full member of its board in October 2019, this came after the intensive participation and the benefit of Egyptian companies from the program's activities in 2018 and 2019 in terms of linking trade relations and partnerships with African countries in the fields of different, especially in the pharmaceutical and food industries.