Egypt’s Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises Development Agency (MSMEDA) expects to sign a €15 million ($17 million) loan agreement with the European Investment Bank (EIB) in the week after next.
The loan accord would be signed on the sidelines of the COMESA’s Africa 2018 Forum, which will take place in Sharm El-Sheikh on December 8-9.
The loan would be used to develop the infrastructure in five governorates in Egypt including rehabilitation of homes and schools, treatment of waters and small canals, providing health services and youth employment, Medhat Massoud, MSMEDA’s head of human and social development sector, said.
MSMEDA, previously known as the Social Fund for Development, is an autonomous development and poverty-alleviation agency, established in 1991 with support of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). It is an agency affiliated to Egypt’s Cabinet, designed to act as a social safety net to undertake the government’s economic reform programme by developing the MSME sector directly or through the coordination of the efforts of the different stakeholders.