On Wednesday, The Egyptian parliament's budget and planning committee approved a draft law submitted by the government on a 'symbiotic contribution' in order to face some economic repercussions due to the spread of pandemics or natural disasters.
Muhammad Maait, Minister of Finance, during the committee meeting, headed by Dr. Hussein Issa, said, "The coronavirus crisis and its economic effects left us with a message that the world has become vulnerable at every moment to of new epidemics that severely affect the economic sector."
He pointed out that the world must prepare to confront such pandemics and viruses, which may cause economic catastrophic impacts, praising the African Union's initiative to set a fund to address the economic repercussions caused by the virus outbreak.
Parliament and coronavirus
He pointed out that the state, despite the coronavirus, has taken previous measures to raise salaries and pensions to mitigate the burdens of economic reform, at a cost of EGP 105 billion.
The minister noted that the coronavirus repercussions affected the budget revenues and increased the rates of expenditures, promoting the state to take a strategic decision to continually reap the fruits of economic reform through reducing and rationalizing consumption.
He added that President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi has proposed establishing a fund to deal with the virus effects and any new pandemics, by reducing the wages of the state 1 % and 0.5 % from the state pensioners for a period of 12 months.
He stated that it the total deductions will range from 8 to 10 billion for the 12-month period, with a view to symbiotically contributing in facing some economic repercussions resulting from the spread of pandemics or natural disasters.
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