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Monday, May 11, 2009

Returning expatriate laborers worries Egypt

CAIRO — Egypt has become concerned over the prospect that millions of expatriate laborers would return home.   

Officials said millions of Egyptian laborers in the Gulf Cooperation Council could lose their jobs during the current economic crisis. They said the biggest concern was that Egyptian construction workers would be fired in such GCC states as Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

"The Egyptian economy is based on the huge expatriate market, which sends billions of dollars home to their families," an official said.

Officials said returning Egyptians would have few opportunities in their native land.

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The state-owned Egyptian Center for Economic Studies said 500,000 Egyptian laborers could lose their jobs in GCC states by 2010. The center said many of the Egyptians have been employed on a temporary basis by contractors in Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Egyptian labor has played a leading role in the construction and service sectors throughout the Arab world, particularly in Jordan, Libya and the Gulf. At least 30 percent of Egyptian construction workers were said to have already lost their jobs in GCC states.

GCC economies were expected to slide into a recession and budget deficits in 2009. Analysts said several GCC states would undergo an economic decline of more than 20 percent amid the drop in the price of crude oil.

Over the last six months, the growth rate of the construction sector dropped from 15.6 percent in 2008 to 9.4 percent in 2009. They cited the increasing cost of credit.

In 2009, unemployment in Egypt was said to have reached 30 percent and inflation 15 percent. In April, President Hosni Mubarak warned that the economic crisis could worsen over the next few months.



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