Egypt’s economic reforms showing positive results, IMF says

Egypt’s economic reforms appear to be working, with growth and revenues picking up in some areas, a senior International Monetary Fund official said.

“Positive results are being progressively seen,” Jihad Azour, head of the IMF’s Middle East department, said in an interview during a visit to Dubai.

He was speaking as an IMF delegation visited Cairo to review Egypt’s reforms before providing another installment of a three-year, $12 billion loan deal which the IMF agreed last November.

Azour said he did not want to pre-judge the results of the mission’s review, but added: “Signs of economic recovery are witnessed, both in terms of increased growth in certain sectors and in terms of growth in revenues, in areas such as tourism and FDI (foreign direct investment).”

The priority now is keeping up the pace of reform and accelerating structural change in the economy, he said.