Minister of Planning Highlights Egypt's Women's Economic Empowerment Efforts at OECD Forum

H.E. Dr. Hala El Said, Minister of Planning and Economic Development, participated in the "Women's Economic Empowerment Forum" held under the theme "Enhancing Women's Economic Empowerment in the Middle East and North Africa: Insights and Perspectives of Key Stakeholders." This participation occurred on the sidelines of the OECD launch event for Egypt's economic report at the organization's headquarters in Paris. The report launch is part of the OECD's program for Egypt.

During her speech, Dr. Hala El Said affirmed that the cooperation between Egypt and the OECD represents a strategic alliance encompassing a wide range of initiatives. She highlighted the significance of the OECD's Egyptian Country Program, launched in 2021, as a testament to this collaboration. The program prioritizes comprehensive structural reforms in Egypt, stimulating significant economic transformation across diverse sectors, including macroeconomic stability, improving the business environment, social safety nets, modernizing the energy sector, and digital infrastructure investments, all while adhering to good governance practices.

El Said emphasized that women in Egypt constitute nearly 49% of the total population. She underscored the continuous commitment and efforts of the Egyptian government towards gender equality and women's empowerment. Egypt has taken unprecedented steps to enhance women's economic empowerment, representation, and leadership roles within the public sector and society at large. The National Strategy for Women's Empowerment, launched in 2017, aligns with Egypt's Vision 2030 through a robust action plan that promotes gender equality and women's economic empowerment.

She mentioned the launch of the "Gender-Responsive Sustainable Development Plan Guide" for 2022, serving as a comprehensive framework to integrate gender considerations into all government programs and projects. Achieving women's economic empowerment necessitates a comprehensive and multi-faceted approach. Egypt's approach focuses on four key pillars: access to resources, education and skill development, reproductive health, and enabling policy environment.

El Said highlighted various initiatives, including the Takaful and Karama cash transfer program, a cornerstone of Egypt's social safety net efforts, which has reached over 3.1 million families and 12 million beneficiaries, 75% of whom are women. This program integrates banking services with social safety net programs, ensuring effective financial services and management for women beneficiaries.

Additionally, initiatives like the "Decent Life" launched in 2019, target 4500 villages with approximately 60 million inhabitants, prioritizing women's economic empowerment to address multidimensional poverty and unemployment rates. Egypt's Central Bank has established a unified financial inclusion data center, facilitating data collection and analysis to address gender gaps in financial access and usage, resulting in over 16 million women being financially included.

El Said discussed the National Project for the Development of the Egyptian Family launched in 2022, aiming to economically empower two million women aged 18 to 45 through financial independence and small-scale projects led by women across Egypt. She emphasized strategic investments in girls' education, vocational training programs, and enhancing skilled female workforce participation, citing initiatives like the Education Reform Program in Egypt (EERP), which has significantly reduced female unemployment rates.

She highlighted the National Program for Women's Leadership launched in 2018, which, in collaboration with various entities, has raised the skills of over 8000 women in 27 governorates. Egypt also launched the "She is for a Digital Future" initiative in 2021, aiming to bridge the gender digital gap through training and capacity building, reaching 4300 women in 27 governorates to date.

In terms of women's representation, she noted that the latest figures indicate the highest representation of women in the Egyptian government at 26% and a record representation in parliament at 15%, with 162 seats out of 596. Additionally, 209 female judges were appointed to the State Council and the Public Prosecution from 2021 to 2022.