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Egypt to achieve positive growth rates in 2020 despite COVID-19: Planning Minister Coronavirus crisis erupted when Egyptian economy was at its best, says Al-Saeed
International institutions project that Egypt will have positive growth rates in 2020, despite the negative outlook for other countries, Minister of Planning Hala Al-Saeed said at a Monday press conference. Al-Saeed added that the global economy is expected to show negative growth rates of between 1.5% and 2.5% due to the pandemic, but Egypt is expected to achieve positive growth rates of 4.2%. She attributed the positive growth to Egypt's diversified economy, which does not depend on one sector alone. Egypt can, instead, depend on several sectors, including construction, building, agriculture and communications. Al-Saeed said the completion of its economic reform programme will support Egypt's ability to withstand the coronavirus crisis, with indicators suggesting the country's economy is at its best. Al-Saeed also said that Egypt achieved a growth of 5.4% in the first half (1H) of the fiscal year (FY) 2019/2020, and was expected to achieve 5.6% during the 2H of FY 2019/2020. She added that the government has developed several scenarios for how the crisis will pan out. The first one assumes that the crisis will end by June, while a second scenario assumes that the crisis will end by September. A final scenario projects that the crisis will come to end at the end of this year. "In all cases the recovery in some sectors will need a long time, such as tourism and transportation, and it will be in the form of a letter U, not V, which means a gradual recovery," the Minister assured.
