The Central Agency for Public Mobilisation and Statistics (CAPMAS) launched Monday a first-of-its-kind report on the living conditions and infrastructure of more than 460 villages in the rural community in Egypt. The report showed that 95.3% of villages in rural communities have primary schools, compared to 18.2% of villages that have secondary schools. Some 83.3% of villages have pharmacies, 69.7% have healthcare units, 60.2% have private clinics, and 2.1% have private hospitals, according to CAPMAS. Head of CAPMAS Abu Bakr El-Gendy said in a statement that the survey covers information that was not previously available. The survey has been conducted in all governorates except North Sinai and South Sinai. Egypt is suffering high poverty rates. The percentage of those living under the poverty line in Egypt is increasing every years; from 16.7% in 1999/2000 to 21.6% in 2008/2009, 25.2% in 2010/2011, and 26.3% in 2012/2013, according to a previous CAPMAS report. The latest report on poverty, issued in October, announced that a total of 28.8% of Egyptian children live in poverty. About half of Egypt's children under the poverty line live in rural areas, particularly Upper Egypt. Meanwhile 29.2% live in urban areas and 26.5% live on the borders. Children are not the only ones living under the poverty line in Egypt, with youths ages 18-29 also seeing a high rate of poverty. Youths represent 20.7 million of the entire population, with 27.7% in poverty. The government announced more than one initiative to combat poverty in the country, especially in rural Upper Egypt. The Tahya Misr fund and the Social Fund for Development (SFD) are two initiatives that focus on this problem, launched in 2015. Despite the low rates, Egypt has made a slight improvement in the annual Global Competitiveness Index issued by the World Economic Forum in September, ranking 91st in infrastructure, up from 100, 137th in its macroeconomic environment up from 141, and 97 to 96 in health and primary education. On the larger scale, Egypt ranked 16 of the 140 countries included in the index's 2015/2016 report. The World Bank provided Egypt with a $400m loan to support 1.5 million Egyptian families in poverty by aiding the Egyptian government's social safety nets with a project called "Takafol we Karama" (Solidarity and Dignity).
