Mohamed Maait, Egyptian Minister of Finance, confirms that the applications registered by Egyptian citizens residing abroad to benefit from the “Facilitation of Car Import for Egyptians Abroad” initiative are pushing our expectations towards $2 billion in revenues.
He explained that the facilities provided to Egyptians residing abroad have contributed to an increase in the number of applicants to benefit from the initiative, who have created accounts on the electronic application and paid the deposit value.
The Minister added that the specialized ministerial committee for following up on the implementation of the initiative is scheduled to discuss, during the coming days, the status of pending transfers from residents of conflict-stricken countries who have been issued payment orders on the electronic platform to consider alternative mechanisms and find appropriate solutions to complete the deposit payment process for these Egyptians residing abroad who have registered their requests on the electronic application and faced banking transfer obstacles beyond their control.
The Minister said that “more than 250,000 import approvals” have been issued and more than 35,000 imported cars have been released for Egyptians abroad so far. He added that the government is working on speeding up the release of the remaining cars, noting that the validity of the “import approval” for shipping and importing cars is 5 years, and that the reduced customs tax is valid throughout the validity period of the “import approval”.
The Minister added that the first owner has the right to import the car without adhering to the year of manufacture, and that others must not exceed 3 years at the time of customs clearance, pointing out that the deposits of Egyptians abroad who have benefited from the car import facilitation initiative will be paid on the scheduled dates at the exchange rate at the time of their due date; as a commitment to the “Public Treasury”.
