Egypt’s Minister of Planning, World Bank delegation discuss future cooperation plan

Dr. Hala El-Said, Minister of Planning and Economic Development, held a meeting with Merza Hussain, Dean of the Board of Executive Directors at the World Bank Group, and Ambassador Raji El-Etreby, Executive Director of the World Bank for Egypt and the Arab Countries to discuss ways of cooperation.The meeting was attended by Dr. Nada Masoud, Economic Adviser to the Minister of Planning, Dr. Sherifa Sharif, and Executive Director of the National Institute for Governance and Sustainable Development (NIGSD), Dr. Jamil Helmy, Assistant Minister of Planning for Follow-up Affairs of the Sustainable Development Plan, and Ambassador Hazem Khairat, Supervisor of the International Cooperation Office at the Ministry.During the meeting, the Minister of Planning and Economic Development reviewed a number of the ministry's work files and the projects it is currently working on, especially the structural reforms aimed at increasing the contribution of the industry, agriculture, and communications sectors to the national product. El-Said also reviewed the features of the presidential initiative "A Decent Life" as the largest development initiative in the world in terms of its scope.
The aforementioned campaign aims to improve the quality of more than 50 million citizens with a budget of EGP 800 billion in 3 years and achieve all the UN sustainable development goals.During the meeting, Dr. Hala El-Said referred to the family development project, which aims to improve the demographic characteristics of Egyptian society.Moreover, El-Said reviewed the activities of The Sovereign Fund of Egypt (TSFE) as an arm of the Egyptian state in building partnerships with the private sector and improving the exploitation of untapped assets through some sub-funds such as education, health, and infrastructure.The meeting touched on issues of recovery after the Corona pandemic, Egypt's interest in the green economy and the issuance of the first green bonds to finance environmentally friendly projects, the government's goal to raise the percentage of green projects in the investment plan to 30% of the budget for the current fiscal year as well as the issuance of environmental sustainability standards in cooperation with the Ministry of Environment.For his part, Merza Hussain praised the steps taken by the Egyptian state to deal with the Corona pandemic, and the ability of the Egyptian economy to recover in light of international economic conditions.
He stressed the bank's interest in deepening cooperation with Egypt and supporting it with all the programs it offers to achieve further economic progress.