Egypt set to double trade with India in few years, hopes to be a part of BRIC

The two countries signed 7 MoUs after Morsy met with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh

Showing Egypt's keeness to be a part of BRICS, the country's President Mohamed Morsy today said that the bilateral trade between India and Egypt is set to double in the next few years.

"Currently, the bilateral trade between both the countries is around $5 billion. We are looking to double this exchange trade volume in the next few years," Morsy said, while addressing a FICCI summit here.

Inviting Indian companies for investments in Egypt, he added, "One of our main focus is on attracting foreign direct investment. Both countries can co-operate in areas like trade, energy, technology and space science."

Egypt is also looking into setting up of free economic zones by Indian companies to trade with third countries.

"I urge Indian corporates to look at Egypt as a manufacturing base to export to other countries," said Commerce minister Anand Sharma.

Meanwhile, Morsy said that BRIC nations like India, Brazil, China and Russia has a major role to play in the development of the country in a democratic set up. He indicated that Egypt is looking forward to a time when it also becomes a part of BRICS, forming E-BRICS.

On Tuesday, both India and Egypt had signed seven agreements, after a meeting of Morsy with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Morsy took charge of Egypt after the revolution in 2011, 'Arab Spring', which removed the 30-year old Hosts Mubarak regime.

The bilateral memoranda of understandring covered sectors like I-T, electronics, cluster development and co-operation between ICT companies.