Maait explained that such efforts to support micro-, small-, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) come under law no.188 for 2020, which governs the contracts the government concludes that offers tax and non-tax incentives besides other facilitations for these key businesses.

The law also targets creating a proper environment for the sector to compete on opportunities public bodies offer.

Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs)’s total capital recorded EGP 77.1 billion in 2020 across about 1.7 million institutions, according to the latest data published by the Central Agency for Public Mobilisation and Statistics (CAPMAS).

Furthermore, the country has registered 3.653 million MSMEs so far, with 9.7 million employees receiving salaries estimated at EGP 119.2 billion.

Amid the ongoing global challenges posed by the pandemic, the Central Bank of Egypt directed all banks in 2021 to raise financing directed to MSMEs to reach 25 percent of banks’ credit facilities portfolios — up from 20 percent — which will avail an extra EGP 117 billion of finance injections into the sector by the end of December 2022.