Minister of Finance Hany Kadry Dimian approved the allocation of EGP 1.5bn to the Supply Commodity Authority (SCA) to repay parties involved in the bread and goods subsidy system for January. The move has raised total availabilities arranged by the Ministry of Finance to EGP 1.7bn during the period from July to January of the fiscal year (FY) 2014/2015. Head of the public budget sector, Mohamed Abdel Fattah, said Dimian also approved the Ministry of Petroleum's budget estimated at EGP 13.898m. The money will repay Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS) from the end of November through January for supplying natural gas to homes. He added that the finance ministry has been working on the gas supply programme with a total cost of over EGP 34m . Companies provided natural gas to nearly 158,434 homes during the period from the beginning of July through to the present time. Abdel Fattah added that an application of the mechanism was established by the finance minister to transfer allocations to various public bodies on a monthly basis until July 2015 without referring back to the finance minister. The public budget council agreed to provide approximately EGP 371m inclusive of EGP 220m provided to the Radio and Television union for payments and wages for January, including EGP 3m provided to Cairo Audio and Video Company. EGP 62.5m will be provided for drinking water and sanitation in order to support its efforts in the provision of pure drinking water and sanitation services to citizens through its subsidiaries. EGP 88.495m is to be provided to subsidiary companies of cotton and textile and clothes to pay wages, in addition to wages of those working in Misr Shebin El Kom Textile and weaving company.
