EGP 698 mln in emergency aid to 393,980 workers thru Sept. amid coronavirus crisis: Manpower ministry
Ahram Online, , Friday 9 Oct 2020
The ministry’s emergency fund is established with the aim of supporting companies that fail to pay their workers’ salaries until they can overcome the hard economic circumstances and continue production


The Ministry of Manpower has paid over EGP 698.1 million in emergency aid to 393,980 workers in 3,352 industrial establishments since the coronavirus crisis started through September.

Minister of Manpower Mohamed Saafan said on Friday that in coordination with the Egyptian Federation of Tourism, the ministry has also provided EGP 273.4 million in emergency aid to around 124,179 workers in 1,915 tourist establishments that were affected by the pandemic.

The aid distributed to workers in tourist establishments is equivalent to 100 per cent of main wages, at a minimum of EGP 600, said the minister during a meeting of the ministry's emergency fund board.

The emergency fund board has also approved more than EGP 3.4 million to 2,822 workers at the Workers Cultural Foundation and at the Workers University, due to hard economic circumstances. The financial aid will be handed to these workers between 12 and 27, October.

Saafan said the ministry’s emergency fund is established with the aim of supporting companies that fail to pay their workers’ salaries until they can overcome the hard economic circumstances and continue production.

Egypt's cabinet said, in a statement on Monday, that it will continue to disburse the EGP 500 ($32) monthly allowance to irregular workers affected by the repercussions of the coronavirus, up until December.

The Egyptian government has been giving irregular workers a monthly financial assistance package for the past three months to help them cope with the economic impact of the pandemic.

The announcement came one week after President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi instructed the prime minister to continue disbursing the EGP 500 monthly allowance till the end of the year.

According to the manpower ministry, over 1.5 million workers received the three-month grant, amounting to a total of over EGP 2.4 billion.

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