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Al-Ahram Weekly 8 - 14 April 1999 Issue No. 424 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 8 - 14 April 1999 Issue No. 424
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Focus Profile Features Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Expats complain about information gap
by Mona El-FiqiMany of the 1,000 expatriates who attended the seventh annual Conference of Egyptian Expatriates in Cairo complained about government decrees that make it more difficult for them to do business in the country such as a recent regulation requiring a certificate of origin for imports. They are also concerned about information bottlenecks that seem to be preventing Egyptians abroad from getting up-to-date data about the Egyptian economy.
The two-day conference held this week was organised by the General Authority for Investment and attracted potential investors from many countries.
Ministers of agriculture, economy, labour and the public sector were keen to showcase the efforts of the government in recent years to encourage Egyptian expatriates to invest in Egypt.
On the other hand, many expatriates blame the government for some of their problems such as the information gap and badly conceived decrees issued without warning which negatively affect their business in Egypt.
The conference was divided into five sessions covering different areas including financial policy, development of new cities, dumping and the protection of local industry, tourism and the achievements of the economic reform programme.
At the beginning of the conference, Ibrahim Fawzi, chairman of the General Authority for Investment, said that the aim of the conference was to meet Egyptian expatriates once a year to inform them about the latest achievements in Egypt and enable them to keep in contact with their counterparts at home.
Fawzi added that the Egyptian economic reform programme has been praised by several international institutions. He said the domestic growth rate increased to 5.7 per cent in 1998, and it is expected to reach 6 per cent by the end of this year. He also said the inflation rate was reduced from 25 per cent three years ago to 4 per cent in 1998.
He added that due to government policy supporting industrial projects, the value of free zone exports increased from $310 million in 1996 to $406 million in 1998.
Fawzi said that one of the main targets of the government is to attract foreign and multinational companies. According to Fawzi, the volume of the foreign contribution in the capital of investment companies rose from LE3.2 billion in 1997 to LE5.1 billion in 1998. He added that the number of investment companies established in 1998 was 2,187.
Ahmed El-Amawi, minister of labour and immigration, said that more than 100,000 jobs have been provided for jobless people as a result of the new employment booklet issued recently by the ministry.
Although El-Amawi said that the immigration department at the ministry helps in providing Egyptian expatriates with information about investment opportunities in Egypt, some expatriates insisted they do not know what is going on.
Laila Razouk, vice-president of the network products division at Advanced Micro Devices Company in the US, said that she attended the conference for the first time to learn what possibilities there are for doing business in Egypt. "Unfortunately I do not know anything about the changes in the Egyptian economy as I have lived abroad since 1971, and we can hardly get news about Egypt there," said Razouk. She hopes that she can do business in Egypt for her company or privately for herself.
Mohamed Shawki, chairman of Al-Hagar Company for import and export in Sydney, Australia, said that the government should provide information needed by Egyptian exporters to help them avoid problems in foreign countries.
For example, Shawki said that due to the Egyptian exporters' not knowing the specifications applied to mangoes exported to Australia, many shipments were refused and returned to Egypt.
Shawki blamed the Egyptian government for responding by banning mango exports to Australia. "Instead of banning mango exports to Australia, it should provide exporters with the required specifications," he said.
According to Shawki, there are many markets in which Egyptian agricultural products such as vegetables and fruits can be distributed easily, like Australia, but a better marketing policy is needed.
Khaled Hilal, an Egyptian importer of raw materials for the leather industry, also has some reservations about existing policies. Hilal said that recently the government suddenly issued a decree saying that all imports should have a certificate of origin from the exporting country. This decree will badly affect the business of small importers. He cited an example: he used to import second-hand machines from Italy which are needed for the leather industry in Egypt, but these machines were fabricated in Germany. Now this decree forbids the import of any machines from Italy unless they are made in Italy.
Moreover, Hilal said that although the government has to open the Egyptian market according to the General Agreement for Trade and Tariffs (GATT), it issued some decrees to prevent certain imports from entering Egypt in order to protect agents of international companies and major importers.
According to Hilal, the effects of such decrees should be well studied before they are issued by the government. The business of thousands of small importers has ground to a halt after the certificate of origin decree was applied one month ago.
Hilal said, "There are hundreds of Egyptian expatriates living in Italy now, and they refuse to invest their capital in Egypt for fear of losing their money as a result of such sudden and haphazard decrees."
