Industrial modernization programs run in parallel

The Egyptian Minister of Industry and Technological DevelopmentMostafa al-Rifaei Monday said the three programmes on modernizing industry in Egypt, financed by the Egyptian government, the private sector and the European Union, run parallelly to develop industrial sectors in order to cope with new changes.

Rifaei said the changes are represented in the signing of the Egyptian-European partnership agreement and Egypt's endeavours to widen the scale of free trade zones with a number of Arab and African countries in addition to the United States.

The first modernization programme costs 450 million euros to be shouldered by the government, the private sector and the European Union.

"The government will pay 103 million, the EU will pay 250 million, while the remaining sum will be funded by the industrial private sector," he added.

"The government will finance in full the 500-million-euro second programme which will boost the modernization of the comprehensive national programme," he pointed out.