By Mohamed al-Afdal |
Mohamed al-Afdal is an Egyptian journalist who reports on policy , economic , and environmental issues . His works appeared in The Guardian , Al Jazeera , Quartz and Grid . |
I n 2011 , during the January 25 Revolution , “ bread ” was one major rallying cry for the millions of protesters who took to Egypt ’ s streets demanding change . Bread signified decades of Egypt ’ s economic struggles , culminating in poverty that afflicted nearly a third of the population while youth unemployment was around 35 %. Since then , in spite of a moment of stability between 2017 and 2021 , Egypt ’ s economic and social misfortunes have not receded .
EXTERNAL WOES
The country ’ s challenges were severely exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic , the international supply chain disruptions that occurred in 2022 , and a severe dollar shortage that same year with billions of dollars fleeing the economy .
Finally , since October 2023 , the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza has had a rippling effect on Egypt , whose economy
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relies significantly on dollar revenues from tourism and the Suez Canal .
While the number of tourists declined in late 2023 before partially recovering in early 2024 , the Suez Canal saw its traffic plummet by 66 % from mid-December to early April as a result of Houthi attacks in the Red Sea .
On the debt front , the crisis worsened in 2022 when the US raised interest rates , causing a prolonged exit of investment , said Egyptian economic researcher Mohamed Gad in an exchange with WEJ .
The cost of servicing debt continued rising afterwards as domestic interest rates grew and the national currency began to weaken in 2022 . By September 2023 , the country faced a whopping $ 51 billion due within a year , an amount equal to roughly one and a half times its 2023 foreign currency reserves .
Thus , the country ’ s external debt reached a record $ 164.5 billion ( around 92.7 % of the GDP ) in 2023 , more than doubling since 2016 . Egypt now boasts
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PHOTO : AMR NABIL / AP PHOTO |