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Al-Ahram Weekly 18 - 24 November 1999 Issue No. 456 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 18 - 24 November 1999 Issue No. 456
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Special Profile Travel Living Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters Moral privacy
When the private sector attains maturity, it becomes an extremely important instrument in the provision of welfare and social services to the underprivileged sectors of the population. In those countries where the private sector has reached its highest stage of development, large corporations establish think tanks and research centres that spearhead the research and development process, as well as training centres whose graduates are well versed in the market's needs without having had to spend years learning information that will be useless in the real world. Such corporations also channel part of the huge profits they amass into good causes, funding charitable organisations, for instance, or the arts.
This is what the private sector must do in Egypt; this is what we must all strive towards. It must achieve the same degree of awareness as to its social responsibilities. We can no longer choose between one economic system and another; the advance of capitalism has proved inexorable. While the market economy has triumphed, however, we must guide the private sector so that it may benefit us in economic, cultural and human development. Hopefully, the business community will come to realise the enormity of its responsibility as regards the human costs of structural adjustment. It cannot blindly imitate its Western counterparts and hope to achieve the same profits without paying the same price.
Based on an interview by Mohamed Salmawy.
