Egypt signs 32 cooperation agreements during 2008 to the tune of $3.8bn

Egypt signed during the 2008 fiscal year 33 cooperation agreements with development partners and various financial institutions with a total value of about US$2.6 billion, of which 12 of the agreements were grants of $1 billion dollars.

Reports by the Ministry of Foreign Trade said here on Monday that the agreements were signed with the European Commission, United States, Canada, Japan, Spain, Germany, the Islamic Development Bank, the World Bank and the Arab Fund for Economic Development, in addition to the 12 soft loans worth a total of 1.4 billion US dollars signed with the Arab Fund, the African Development Bank and the Kuwaiti Fund for Development, as well as the OPEC Fund, Germany, Spain and Austria.

The value of this assistance helped support several sectors including electricity, housing, utilities and many others, the report states.

The European Union and European countries were in the forefront of countries that provided assistance to Egypt, with the value of aid put at about US$1.37billion, followed by international funding organizations, then followed by US, Japan and Canada.