Egypt’s Minster of Finance, Mohamed Maeet, held talks with his Hong Kong counterpart, Paul Chan, on Friday on the sidelines of their participation in the Asian Financial Forum (AFF 2024) to discuss ways to strengthen ties between the two countries.
The 17th AFF opened Wednesday in Hong Kong with highlighting the potential of the Chinese mainland market and the role and advantages that Hong Kong can play. More than 3,600 policymakers and business leaders from more than 50 countries are taking part in the forum.
The talks highlighted financial policies and mechanisms to flexibly tackle pressures of global repercussions caused by geopolitical tensions.
Minister Maeet has reiterated that Egypt is working on achieving high, inclusive and sustainable economic growth led by the private sector for development and economic recovery.
He said the state would create an enabling environment to support local and foreign investments with tax, customs incentives and facilitations, citing a number of key initiatives such as the ‘State Ownership Policy Document’, ‘Golden License’ and the initial public offering programme.
Maeet has made it clear that the state is carrying out a slew of structural reforms to support promising sectors in line with its efforts to achieve optimal exploitation of resources. He stressed the importance of stimulating the economy’s international competitiveness as well as improving the country’s business climate to lure more investment inflows.
The minister also reiterated the government’s commitment to achieve financial discipline and slashing debt rate below 85 per cent by June 2028, in addition to prolonging debt maturities of budget agencies to four years in the medium term up from three years.
For his part, Hong Kong’s Financial Secretary Paul Chan expressed his endeavor to increase cooperation with Egypt in a number of sectors such as investment, especially financial services.
The two ministers signed a free trade agreement, aimed at protecting investments and increasing scholarships for Egyptian students at universities in Hong Kong.
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