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Celebrating poverty: the IMF in Egypt

Under IMF reforms, a third of Egyptians are living in poverty. But western institutions are celebrating their ‘success’.

By Amr Khafagy
Celebrating poverty: the IMF in Egypt
Graffiti on the walls in Cairo. It reads: 'The poor come first' | Image: Amira Elwakil, CC by 2.0
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This article is part of ourEconomy's 'Decolonising the economy' series.

Who does economic policy work for?

The IMF, World Bank, Bloomberg, and Financial Times, alongside big investment banks such as Morgan Stanley, are celebrating Egypt’s economic success. As the Chief Global Strategist at Morgan Stanley declared last August, Egypt witnessed “the best reform story in the Middle East, perhaps in any emerging market”. No wonder the Governor of the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) and the Minister of Finance were confident to announce the IMF program in Egypt as “the most successful in [its] history”.

The IMF three-year agreement with Egypt is a $12 billion loan ‘to restore macroeconomic stability’. The agreement was signed in November 2016, when Egypt was facing a rapid increase in the government deficit and public debt, decreasing foreign exchange reserves, low economic growth rates, and a widening gap between official and unofficial currency markets.

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Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0