Egyptian government hopes to attract foreign investment

The government is reforming the business climate to attract foreign investment — and it has gas and oil projects at the top of its wish-list

Egypt is trying to draw a line under the four years of instability which followed the 2011 uprising. Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, the former army commander who was elected president in May last year — the previous year he had deposed Mohamed Morsi, the Islamist leader who won the 2012 election — has a vision of an outward-looking Egypt, leading the fight against Islamist extremism. Foreign investment is to be encouraged with economic reforms and deregulation. The country’s troubled gas sector — production is declining, exports have collapsed and shortages have developed inland — was an early target. Improved terms led BP to announce the go-ahead for its West Nile Delta development in March — a $12