On 8th June 2021, Eng. Tarek El Molla, Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, highlighted how economic reforms, helped Egypt to regain its position on the global investment map, along with the support of President El-Sisi for developing the efforts of all sectors and activities of the State. He pointed out that Egypt succeeded in obtaining the appreciation of international institutions, whereas the International Monetary Fund (IMF) announced that Egypt is the 2nd major economy in the Arab region within the year 2020. In addition, many international institutions and organizations admitted that Egypt is the favorite international destination for investments, especially in the Petroleum Sector. It was obviously clear that major foreign companies are keen to pump investments in Egypt, especially in oil, gas and mining domains. The Minister pointed out that total investments pumped in the Oil and Gas Sector during the period from 2014/2015 to 2019/2020 reached to about $74 billion.
That was during the Minister's speech at the virtual webinar, held by the British Egyptian Business Association – BEBA via video conference entitled: "Oil and Gas Sector's Achievements", in the presence of Khaled Nosseir, chairman of BEBA.
The Minister pointed out that achieving natural gas self-sufficiency contributed to increasing the gas consumption rate in the energy mix in Egypt to reach 62% during the fiscal year 2019/2020, compared to 48% during the fiscal year 2014/2015. The Petroleum Sector targets reaching 65% during the fiscal year 2022/2023. Thais comes within the framework of Egypt's commitment to international agreements and the global trend concerned with decarbonization and preserving the environment. Natural gas is considered the best fossil fuel, with its eco- friendly characteristics and is adopted by many countries as a transitional fuel towards expanding the uses of new and renewable energies.
The Minister asserted that one of the most significant objectives of the Petroleum Sector is ensuring energy security and avoiding any supply gaps, in addition to achieving financial sustainability through; dues regular payment to foreign partners, energy subsidies reform, solving financial disputes among State's sectors, as well as achieving maximum added value from oil and gas resources and applying the governance principles by investing in the human cadres, implementing training programs, building capabilities, and creating an attractive climate for investments.
El Molla mentioned the signing of 98 agreements with IOCs for oil and gas exploration and exploitations since 2014, an unpresented number that has never been achieved before, in addition to implementing 4 significant refining projects, with total investments of $4.6 billion for producing high quality products, asserting that the exported amounts of petroleum products have been reduced by 35%.
