The minimum wage will be set for the private sector starting from October 2011, daily newspaper Al-Masry Al-Youm has reported. Minister of Manpower Ahmed Al-Borai said the minimum wage of LE700 ($ 118.6) would be applied to all sectors except tourism, which is still suffering after the 25 January revolution. Instead, the sector will see the new minimum wage in January 2012. “Projects with fewer than five employees will not be required to apply the minimum wage,” Al-Borai is reported to have said on Saturday. “The investor's associations in eight governorates signed the minimum wage agreement in the manpower ministry on Saturday,” Kamal Abass, head of the Centre for Trade Union and Workers' Services (CTUWS) told Ahram Online. Abass added there were rejections from business owners for the value of the minimum wage. They have asked the Labour Minister reduce their owed social insurances in exchange for their approval of the LE700 wage, but the Minister did not agree to any bartering. Egypt's labour minister Ahmed Hassan El-Borai said on 5 August 2011 that businessmen's organisations have approved imposing a minimum wage after five meetings for discussing the subject, but did not specify the names of the organisations referred to. During a seminar with the General Chambers of Commerce Federation (GCCF), El-Borai pointed out that the government would not make any unilateral decisions regarding a wage floor in Egypt's private sector.
