CAIRO, Nov. 14 (Xinhua) -- Egypt's non-oil exports rose by 11 percent to reach 18.4 billion U.S. dollars during the first ten months of 2017 compared with 16.5 billion dollars in the same period last year, said an official report released on Tuesday.
The monthly report of the General Organization of Export and Import Control (GOEIC) shows that construction material, chemical, engineering and food industries, ready-made garments, and agricultural crops constituted 83 percent, or over 15.3 billion dollars, of the country's non-oil exports from January to October 2017.
"Exports of leather material and products declined by 13 percent to 96 million dollars from January to October 2017 compared with 111 million in the same period last year," said the GOEIC report.
It noted that fellow Arab states imported 40 percent of Egypt's non-oil products in the said period, while European Union states imported 28 percent, non-Arab African states 6 percent and the United States 6 percent. The other 20 percent went to other countries around the world.
Egypt has been suffering economic recession over the past few years of political instability and relevant security issues that led to the decline of tourism and foreign investments, two main sources of the country's national income and foreign currency reserves.
Besides floating its local currency's exchange rate to face dollar shortage, Egypt started last year a three-year economic reform program including austerity measures, fuel subsidy cuts and tax hikes.
The program is encouraged by a 12-billion-dollar loan from the International Monetary Fund, a third of which has already been delivered to Egypt in two tranches in November 2016 and July 2017. Enditem
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