Egypt - Minister of International Cooperation Rania Al-Mashat announced the House of Representatives’ approval of two agreements in its session on Monday, the first of which is for the construction of Alexandria’s Metro and the second is for the second phase of rehabilitating hydropower stations.

The House approved President Abdel Fattah Al-Sisi’s decision No. 122 of 2022 regarding the approval of a loan agreement for the construction of Alexandria’s Metro between Egypt and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) amounting to €250m.

The legislative body also approved decision No. 120 of 2022 regarding the approval of exchanged letters between the Egyptian and German governments regarding an additional loan amounting to €15m for the second phase of the rehabilitation of hydropower stations project.

Commenting on the approval of the two agreements, Al-Mashat said that the first agreement aims to help finance a project to develop an existing railway linking the city centre of Alexandria with the Abu Qir area, which is located in the north-east of the governorate, and providing it with electricity to become a highly efficient metro system.

The project comprises infrastructure works for the development of the line, its electrification, and related railway systems, including the development of signalling, communication and central control systems, the railway cars that will be operated on the new metro line, construction supervision, and site preparation work.

The minister also praised the huge investments of the EBRD in Egypt, which has an investment portfolio of about €8.6bn in 145 projects since the beginning of its operation in the country in 2012, more than 76% of which were directed to the private sector. Egypt was also the bank’s largest country of operations in the South and East region for 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021.

Commenting on the second agreement with the German government, Al-Mashat confirmed that the size of the development cooperation portfolio with Germany amounted to €1.7bn in four sectors with the aim of achieving the sustainable development goals.