Cairo - XINHUA
Prime Minister Ibrahim Mahlab attended the signing of a number of loan agreements on funding projects in the electricity sector and small and medium-sized enterprises. The agreements were signed with the Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development and the French Agency for Development. Minister of Planning and International Cooperation Ashraf el-Arabi signed two agreements with the fund worth dlrs 200 million, one will go to a thermal power plant in Assiut to increase the electricity capacity of Egypt's power grid by around 650 megawatt and the other, worth dlrs 162 million will be allocated to promoting the Egyptian-Saudi electricity grid. The minister also signed with French Ambassador to Egypt Nicolas Galey and the agency's Executive Director Jean Marc Gravellini an 80-million-dollar agreement to support small and micro-sized enterprises.