The World Bank said Wednesday that it had agreed to provide Egypt with a $500 million (EGP 9.4 billion) loan to boost food security and cushion the Arab world’s populous country from economic fallout from the pandemic and Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Egypt’s international cooperation ministry said in a statement that the funds will primarily support the country’s wheat purchases to help the government maintain a strategic reserve and utilize the investments made in raising the nation’s grain storage capacity.
“In spite of the changing global conditions and current crises resulting from the repercussions of the Russian-Ukrainian war and the COVID-19 pandemic, Egypt seeks to boost food security and stimulate sustainable food security,” Rania el-Mashat, Egypt’s International Cooperation Minister and the country’s governor at the World Bank.
The North African country has been ramping up efforts to fight inflation, including the central bank’s decisions to raise its key interest rate and devalue the local currency in March. Last week, Egypt’s central bank kept its interest rates unchanged while noting that the ongoing war in Ukraine is among the main external shocks to prices a month after the top lender delivered its biggest hike in nearly half a decade.
Egypt has also received help from its oil-rich GCC allies who’ve pledged more than $22 billion in deposits and investments in recent months. Egypt and Saudi Arabia signed 14 investment deals worth $7.7 billion while Abu Dhabi’s ADQ acquired stakes in five publicly-traded Egyptian companies for $1.8 billion and Qatar pledged $5 billion worth of investment.
The country has received $5.9 billion from the World Bank and the funds encompass 15 projects worth $5.5 billion in various sectors.
