Egypt expects China to become its top 5 investor

Egypt wants to become among the top five or top 10 Chinese investment destinations in the next few years. Currently, China ranks 23rd in investment

Egypt's Minister of Investment Dalia Khorshid and Minister of Trade and Industry Tarek Kabil held a joint news conference in Beijing on Tuesday.

Khorshid said that China's Belt and Road Initiative provide a good opportunity for both sides to enhance cooperation. Egypt is now improving its investment policies and environment to attract more Chinese companies.

She said that Chinese investment is very welcomed, particular in sectors such as power, transportation, infrastructure and fiberglass and textile industries.

There are 1,269 Chinese companies established in Egypt with total contributions of $548 million, 68 percent of their capital is in the industrial sector, 15 percent is directed to financing services, while 9 percent is in the ICT sector.

Kabil said that China's capital, loans and financing platforms are also needed in Egypt's development. They also would like to learn from Chinas' experience in economic development, such as how to encourage numerous of small- and medium-sized companies to prosper, and building industrial parks.

He said Egypt has already done a lot in the building of infrastructure. Its economy is recovering, and in the past two years the annual growth was 2.5 percent, and is expected to reach about 5 percent next year.

Moreover, Egypt has a population of about 9 million, which is growing by 2.5 percent every year. Egypt is also an well-placed for Chinese companies to enter Europe and Middle East market, which means, entering Egypt will help Chinese companies reach the total size of market of 1.6 billion people, he said.

As tourism is an important part of economic growth, Egypt would also like to attract more Chinese tourist. They expect the number of 2016 will double that of the 2015, which was about 115,000 Chinese tourists.

Ministry of Investment delegation headed by Khorshid is in Beijing for the Joint Egyptian-Chinese Ministerial Committee meetings held from July 11th to 12th. The Egyptian delegation headed by Kabil will discuss with China's 15 specific capacity-building projects, which are the top priority for both the Egyptian and Chinese governments.