LOC09:02
06:02 GMT
WASHINGTON, May 19 (KUNA) -- President Barack Obama on Thursday will
announce an initiative that, through partnerships with global development
banks, aims to speed economic transformation and democratization in Egypt and
Tunisia, senior administration officials said in a background briefing on
Wednesday evening.
The plan is intended to help transform the economies of the two countries
"to ensure fairer treatment for all their citizens and to expand
opportunities, particularly for the young," said one official, in a partial
preview of the speech Obama will deliver Thursday on the challenges in the
Middle East and North Africa.
First, "we are going to galvanize support from the international community,
" the official said.
The multilateral development banks -- the World Bank, the African
Development Bank and the International Monetary Fund -- are working with the
United States and other partners to help the two countries develop
"fundamental transformations of their economy that will allow vendors to
provide for their families with dignity, women to get loans to start
businesses, and of course that young people should be able to find jobs to
build a better future," the official said.
"As part of this, we are committed to reorienting the European bank for
reconstruction development to support the transitions unfolding in the Middle
East and North Africa," he said.
Additionally, the United States will cancel enough Egyptian debt that "we
anticipate that the debt swap, both relief of debt and the investments that
would ensue, would amount to roughly 1 billion dollars over a few years, and
that the loan guarantees would support roughly an additional billion," a
second official said.
This will channel additional resources to address Egypt's medium-term
development needs, "in particular building a new inclusive economy that will
generate more private-sector jobs and more opportunities for young people,"
the official said. "And of course we will ask our partners to join us in this
initiative."
As another part of the effort to help Egypt invest in its people and regain
access to global capital markets and investment, "we will guarantee up to a
billion dollars in borrowing to finance infrastructure and support job
creation through our Overseas Private Investment Corporation, OPIC," the
official said.
"And finally, we are very supportive of efforts to obtain authorizations to
establish an Egyptian-American enterprise fund which also will help with the
goals of stimulating private-sector investment and promoting projects that
generate jobs," the official added.
The countries of the Middle East and North Africa share an untapped
potential of their people, another official said. A majority of the population
is under 30 -- 4 million people entering the labor force every year, the
official noted.
"In Egypt alone, youth unemployment was estimated to be 30 percent, and so
there is a great deal to be done to ensure that the benefits of economic
growth and reform are widely shared, bringing people into the work force, and
providing jobs and opportunities," the official said.
The initiative is based around four broad pillars: support for better
economic management; support for economic stability; support for economic
modernization and reform; and the development of a framework for trade
integration and investment, one of the officials said. (end)
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