State subsidies on food and petroleum products will not be subject to any decreases, Social Solidarity Minister Ali al-Meselhi announced this week.
He added, however, that the state subsidy program would be "restructured" in order to ensure that subsidies go to the socio-economic segments that require them most.
“The same subsidies program has been in place since the time of King Fouad,” the minister said. “It must be brought into line with modern economic and political developments.”
At a symposium hosted by the Egyptian Center for Economic Studies, al-Meselhi explained that the poorest 20 percent of the Egyptian population received only 16 percent of total state subsidies, while the wealthiest 20 percent received as much as 28 percent.
“We have recently completed a database of 3.5 million families nationwide that are most in need of subsides,” he told the audience.
Translated from the Arabic Edition.
