The Ministers of Planning, Education, Tourism, Trade, and Industry witnessed the signing ceremony of an MoU signed between planning ministry & Egypt's manpower project

Dr. Hala El-Said, Minister of Planning and Economic Development, Dr. Tarek Shawky, Minister of Education and Technical Education, Dr. Khaled Al-Anani, Minister of Tourism and Antiquities, and Nevin Gamea, Minister of Trade and Industry witnessed the signing of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) to support and implement the activities of the “Egypt Manpower ” project, between the Ministry of Planning and Economic Development, and the Egypt Workforce Project, funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID).The signing of the Memorandum of Understanding took place in the presence of Leslie Reed, USAID Mission Director in Egypt, Dr. Mohamed Megahed, Deputy Minister of Education for Technical Education, Joseph Ghanem, Director of the Egypt Manpower Project, and Dr. Nada Masoud, Economic Advisor to the Minister of Planning and Economic Development, and Engineer Tarek Tawfik, Deputy Dean of the Board of Directors of the Federation of Egyptian Industries and Rapporteur of the work on the business environment of the national program of structural reforms.
During her speech, Dr. Hala El-Said said that Egypt had launched the National Structural Reform Program to complement the National Economic Reform Program launched in 2016; she noted that one of the biggest challenges at the time of the implementation of the program was the sustainability of growth and maximization of the value of the productive sectors, which strengthens the capacity of the Egyptian economy to withstand and cope with crises.
El-Said explained that the national program of structural reforms focuses on three promising sectors: industry, agriculture, communications, and information technology and that there is an axis that intersects with the three sectors, which is the Egyptian labor market.El-Said highlighted that Egypt has a demographic advantage represented by the high proportion of young people, which reaches 60% of the size of the population, so the best investment is to invest in youth, and the skills to be more efficient and adapted to the needs of the future labor market.El-Said added that although all countries in times of crisis tend to implement programs and plans that mitigate the repercussions of crises, Egypt is the only country that has seized the opportunity of the Corona pandemic to implement a development and reform program.


El-Said emphasized that the workforce in Egypt is the basis of the growth system, noting that the achievement of Egypt has a growth rate of 9% during the first half of the current financial year and that all sectors achieved positive growth rates.El-Said referred to the creation of the Labor Market Policy Unit which examines the two sides of supply and demand in the labor market, and the specializations that this market needs, whether at the now or in the future, which will be reflected on the pre-university and university education system, the skills required in different sectors, and the improvement of the quality of employment, whether in Egypt or exported abroad to be more competitive, especially since workers' remittances abroad are considered one of the most important sources of exchange for the Egyptian economy.
El-Said concluded her speech by emphasizing that the Sector Skills Councils Platform in Egypt is an umbrella that starts with the Egyptian Labor Project and includes in the same institutional framework all private sector partners, or different development partners, and the goal is to invest in the future and invest in Egypt's most precious wealth, which is the human element.In his speech, Dr. Tarek Shawky expressed his joy at signing the memorandum of understanding, stressing that the government is seeking, backed by unprecedented support and political will from President Abdel Fattah El-Sissi, President of the Republic, towards a complete and global solution.He stressed that this strategy depends on the successful and effective partnership between the Ministry of Education and Technical Education, ministries and state institutions, the private sector, and the public enterprises' sector, in cooperation with partners international.Dr. Tarek Shawky said Sector Skills Councils are entities run by private sector business owners, which are created to ensure that providers of technical education and vocational training serve an industrial sector and address the needs of business owners in this sector for graduates who have mastered the appropriate technical skills.He stressed that one of the main reasons for the establishment of sector skills councils is to address issues of international competitiveness and to recognize that technical skills are constantly changing and updating and need to be developed at the sectoral level rather than at the economy as a whole.He pointed out that the core tasks of sector skills councils include providing labor market information and analysis on a sectoral basis, identifying skills gaps in terms of quality and the required number of workers.


For his part, Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Khaled El-Anany praised the teamwork that includes all sectors of the state, noting that in the framework of the Egypt Manpower project, the Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities is cooperating to establish sector skills councils in Egypt to meet the need between supply and demand as part of the state's 2030 sustainable development plan.Nevin Gamea, Minister of Trade and Industry, indicated the need to equip workers with a certain degree of technical and required skills; to cover the gap between supply and demand, saying that this agreement is characterized by being an umbrella in which the ministries concerned to come together to provide all our needs for qualified technical manpower required by the labor market.Sherihan Naguib, Deputy Minister of International Cooperation, in her speech, on behalf of Dr. Rania Al-Mashat, Minister of International Cooperation, expressed her joy at signing the MoU, which aims to push efforts towards achieving comprehensive and sustainable development, and strives to create employment opportunities and meet labor market needsLeslie Reed expressed his joy in cooperating with the Egyptian government in its various sectors to achieve the objectives of economic reform and sustainable development.