Cabinet media center underlines positive change in foreign media coverage of Egypt economy

BY

-

Sun, 09 Jun 2019 - 04:18 GMT

BY

Sun, 09 Jun 2019 - 04:18 GMT

President Abdel Fatah El Sisi held a meeting on Thursday with the Cabinet members on Thursday, May 9, 2019- press photo

President Abdel Fatah El Sisi held a meeting on Thursday with the Cabinet members on Thursday, May 9, 2019- press photo

CAIRO - 9 June 2019: The cabinet media center has underlined a change in the way foreign media covers the economic performance in Egypt.

News agencies, such as Bloomberg, Reuters, and Financial Times, have been pointing to tangible growth following economic reforms adopted by Cairo, the media center Sunday on its official social media page.

In 2013, Bloomberg posted a negative outlook of the Egyptian economy, based on an unstable currency market at the time. It had also cited a record low of foreign currency reserves that reached 13.6 billion dollars. Bloomberg had also touched upon a far recovery of the tourism sector following the January 25 Revolution in 2011. An unemployment rate of 12.5 percent was also highlighted by Bloomberg in 2013.

In 2019, Bloomberg said the Egyptian pound is among the best in terms of performance in emerging markets. It now points to a rebounding travel sector, an increase in foreign currency reserves to 44 billion dollars and a decline in unemployment rates to 8.9 percent.

Reuters outlook was also negative in 2013 due to the diesel oil crisis that spiraled back then across Egypt, not to mention its worst ever energy problem.

Back then Reuters blamed it all on what it called over-subsidy at a time public debt was also soaring.

Reuters now adopts a more positive forecast for the Egyptian economy, the center said, noting that it chose to focus on a budget surplus that was achieved for the first time in 15 years in 2018.

It now touches upon Egypt's attempts to become a regional hub of gas trading following a decision to stop importing liquefied gas.

Financial Times had, likewise, adopted a negative approach when handling reports from Egypt mainly due to a decline in the Gross Domestic Product that started in the wake of the January 25 Revolution and continued in the country through July 2013.

It had also pointed to slow navigation movement along the Suez Canal, which it called an important source of national income.

This has changed in 2019, with Financial Times shedding more light on economic reform measures in Egypt, such as the flotation of the Egyptian pound, which are now bearing fruit.

It now points to a decline in the inflation rate to 13.3 percent and expects a drop in budget deficit to 8.4 percent in 2018-2019.

Comments

0

Leave a Comment

Be Social