The Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry was a co-organiser of a Business Forum held in Cairo, the capital of Egypt. The event took place on the occasion of the official visit of Bulgaria's Foreign Affairs Minister Georg Georgiev and was organised together with the Egyptian Chambers of Commerce Federation and the Bulgarian Embassy in Cairo. The Forum was targeted at encouraging the bilateral economic cooperation between Bulgarian and Egyptian businesses. For many years now, the Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry and the Federation of the Egyptian Chambers of Commerce have fostered their partnership, which started in the early 1994.
At the opening of the event, Dr. Eng. Veselin Todorov, Member of the BCCI Management Board and Chairperson of the Sectoral Organisations Council at the Chamber, shared that over the years, BCCI has implemented numerous joint initiatives with partners from Egypt – namely, business forums, business meetings and online seminars. The Bulgarian Chamber of Commerce and Industry is open to any new initiatives and is willing to support each company, showing interest in the Bulgarian or Egyptian market.
2024 witnessed a record increase in the bilateral trade exchange reaching 1.81 billion US dollars – a growth of 41% compared to the previous year, which establishes Bulgaria, among all EU Member States, as the eighth most important trading partner of Egypt. Also, Bulgaria ranked among the leading exporters of wheat to Egypt, with a 60% increase in volumes, compared to the previous year.
17 Bulgarian companies and more than 200 Egyptian firms took part in the Forum. The event focused on business cooperation in the following sectors: high technologies, the energy sector, food and drink industry, agriculture, special produce, lighting equipment, construction, petroleum industry, pharmaceutical industry and tourism, among others.
Special guests of the event were Dr. Sherif Farouk, Minister of Supply and Internal Trade of Egypt, Mr Georg Georgiev, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Bulgaria, and Lieutenant General Eng. Kamel Al-Wazir, Deputy Prime Minister for Industrial Development and Minister of Industry and Transport
The host Ahmed El Wakil, President of the Egyptian Chambers of Commerce Federation, welcomed the participants in the event and underlined Egypt's potential to be the businesses’ entrance gateway to the whole African continent.