While the world bets in a continued slowdown of the economic growth in 2020 because of COVID-19 – a novel Coronavirus – the Egyptian economy should be maintaining stable rates of 5.6 percent during the second quarter and first half of this fiscal year.
In a statement published this Wednesday (19), Hala el-Saeed, the Egyptian Minister of Planning and Economic Development said also that Egypt’s high rate of economic during the second quarter and the first half of the fiscal year 2019-2020 increased to 5.6 percent compared to the same period in previous years.
In a statement published this Wednesday (19), Mrs. Hala el-Saeed, the Egyptian Minister of Planning and Economic Development said also that this result was driven by the expansion of the sectors of oil refining, telecommunications, construction, and building, with the continued development of the tourism sector, according to her. For the fiscal year 2020/2021, the Egyptian government targets a growth rate of 6.4 percent.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) reduced its forecasts for the global growth rate for 2020 for the third time from 3.6 percent in April 2019 to 3.3 percent in January 2020. The spread of the Corona Virus is one of the reasons for this reduction.
The first case of coronavirus was reported in Wuhan, China On December 31. The number of confirmed cases worldwide reached 75,286 resulting in 2,010 deaths.
Egypt confirmed last Friday (14) its first coronavirus case. The affected person is a foreigner who traveled to China last month and had been put into isolation in a hospital. The contacts of the confirmed case are being traced, and so far, all have tested negative but will be actively followed up on for 14 days.