The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has allocated $2 billion to fund development projects in Egypt during 2023, stated Heike Harmgart, Regional Director for the Southern and Eastern Mediterranean Region at the bank on Monday. The statements were made during a meeting with Egypt's minister of International Cooperation, Rania Al-Mashat, and several representatives of international banks and institutions to follow up on the efforts to mobilize innovative tools to finance the energy sector within the Nexus of Water, Food and Energy (NWFE) progarmme. NWFE is a platform launched in 2022 to provide opportunities for mobilizing climate finance and private investments to support Egypt's green transition. Al-Mashat said that Egypt plans to transform into a regional centre for renewable energy. Director of the French Development Agency(AFD)'s office in Egypt, Clemence Vidal, stressed the agency's commitment to support the NWFE and finance projects with €100 million and provide a €10 million grant. "We also express our interest in boosting the national strategy for green hydrogen, as part of the global strategy to replace fossil fuels with renewable resources," she said. For her part, representative of the European Investment Bank (EIB), Christina Kanapetskit, noted that the bank has allocated a total of €1.3 billion to enhance transition to renewable energy. The EBRD has announced earlier in October its plan to grant a €165 million loan to support the upgrade of the electricity transmission grid in Egypt.
