The African Development Bank’s (AfDB) Board of Governors agreed unanimously to Egypt’s request to host the annual meeting of the bank group that is scheduled to be held between 22 and 26 May 2023 in Sharm El-Sheikh City, Tarek Amer — the Governor of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) and Governor of Egypt at the AfDB Group — announced on Tuesday 21 September.

The decision demonstrates the depth of relations between Egypt and the AfDB Group, and the international commendation for the unprecedented achievements accomplished by Egypt during the past few years in regard to political stability, economic growth, and infrastructure development, the CBE said.

On his part, Amer welcomed the decision, applauding the historical relations between Egypt and the AfDB — as Egypt is one of the bank’s founding states since the 1960s — and the robust strategic partnership with the bank group, which was built on the basis of joint cooperation to achieve Egypt’s sustainable development strategic goals.

Moreover, the two sides are working on enhancing and deepening internal mutual African cooperation while providing the necessary funds to finance the continent’s development agenda, backed by the strong Egyptian political leadership that supports this mandate and through the utilisation of stellar Egyptian expertise in all fields.

Ahmed Zayed, Egypt and Djibouti’s representative in the AfDB’s Board of Directors, pointed out that Egypt has unprecedently succeeded in meeting and complying with all of the bank’s required specifications and standards to host the annual meetings.

This is considered a testimony to Egypt’s fruitful efforts in developing its domestic infrastructure while achieving political and economic stability, which has always been recognised by the bank’s Board of Directors in its meetings.

On 18 September 2019, Egypt hosted the AfDB’s Board of Governors’ Consultative Committee meetings in Sharm El-Sheikh under the auspices of Tarek Amer, who chaired the Egyptian delegation during the meeting.

In this meeting, the governors successfully concluded the negotiations to increase the bank’s capital base for the seventh time by 125 percent to reach $208 billion, up from $93 billion.

Egypt is Africa’s second biggest shareholder in the AfDB’s capital.

Also, Egypt is one of the only three African countries that contributes to the African Development Fund, which aims to develop low-income African countries.

The aggregate size of the cooperation portfolio between Egypt and the AFDB since the beginning of their developmental cooperation in 1974 has reached circa $6.4 billion, which has supported financing a number of major developmental projects in Egypt in addition to continental connectivity projects.

Regarding the current portfolio, the bank's total contributions have averaged $1 billion, which are being utilised to finance 22 projects in both the private and public sectors, covering the fields of energy, transportation, agriculture, water and irrigation, sewage, and entrepreneurship.