The presidency said the talks highlighted Cairo’s view of education as a key pillar in its long-term partnership with Tokyo, amid efforts to modernize curricula, strengthen technical education, and deepen people-to-people exchanges.
El-Sisi welcomed the Japanese minister and asked him to convey his greetings to Emperor Naruhito and Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi, Presidential Spokesperson Ambassador Mohamed El-Shennawy said.
The president reaffirmed Egypt’s pride in its longstanding cooperation with Japan, praising Tokyo’s support for the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) and the success of the Egyptian-Japanese Schools (EJS) programme.
El-Sisi said Egypt aims to expand the number of EJS across governorates, increase the involvement of Japanese principals and experts in their management, and benefit from Japan’s experience in school discipline, governance, and educational planning.
Matsumoto said he would relay El-Sisi’s greetings to Japan’s leadership, noting that his visit to Egypt was his first overseas trip since taking office, reflecting Tokyo’s priority to strengthen education cooperation with Cairo.
He described the Egyptian-Japanese Schools initiative as a successful development model and an example of Japan’s support to partners in Africa and the Middle East.
The Japanese minister also congratulated Khaled El-Anany on his election as director-general of UNESCO and expressed Japan’s interest in continuing close coordination with the organization under its new leadership.
The meeting covered practical areas of cooperation, including curriculum development, the planned introduction of software studies for about 750,000 students based on Japanese educational models, strengthening technical and vocational education, training Egyptian teachers to deliver Japanese language and curricula, and supporting education and rehabilitation programmes for persons with special needs.
The two sides also discussed expanding Japanese schools in Egypt as a model that could be replicated across Africa and the Arab region.
El-Sisi thanked Japan for its support in various sectors, particularly education, and said Egypt aims to double the number of Japanese schools in the country over the next five years, increase Japanese expert participation, and expand student exchange programmes.
Egypt plans to expand its EJS network from 69 to 500 schools within five years and introduce Japanese-designed curricula across the state system.
From the 2025/2026 academic year, Grade 1 students will study a Japanese-standard mathematics curriculum developed jointly with Tokyo and taught as it is in Japanese schools.
At the same time, Egypt has adopted Japan’s QUREO platform as the national coding and AI curriculum for first-year secondary students. Authorities say this is among the region’s largest digital education rollouts, with 750,000 registered learners and 236,000 students completing the course.
On Monday, Social Solidarity Minister Maya Morsy met a delegation from Japan’s House of Councillors in Cairo to scale up a Japanese-supported early childhood education model nationwide and explore cooperation in elderly care.
The discussions focused on a strategic expansion of an adapted Japanese curriculum emphasizing learning through play, building on pilots in government-run nurseries and a national nursery census conducted in 2025.
Morsy also highlighted Egypt’s interest in Japan’s elderly care programmes following the finalization of executive regulations for the Elderly Rights Care Law and cited ongoing efforts to protect women through national mechanisms, including the National Council for Women.
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