Minister of Planning and Economic Development, Hala El-Said, has recently announced that the government’s push to promote e-payments nationwide has been doing well, stating that L.E36 million has been collected since September through the government’s payment platform.
Minister of Planning and Economic Development, Hala El-Said, has recently announced that the government’s push to promote e-payments nationwide has been doing well, stating that L.E36 million has been collected since September through the government’s payment platform.
This comes after the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE) and Federation of Egyptian Banks (FEB) launched a joint campaign to raise awareness about the benefits of electronic payments. The campaign aimed to raise awareness and increase interactions and usage of several points of sale (POS) and QR codes.
In September, Finance Minister Mohamed Maeet released a statement mentioning that electronic revenue grew by 223% at the end of July this year, compared to 2019.
Soon after, the Arab Monetary Fund’s (AMF) reported that Egypt leads the Arab world in terms of e-payment services and digital wallet usage. The report also mentioned that there were 141 million electronic retail payment transactions accounted for in 2019 in the Arab world.
The new numbers provide insight in how far Egypt’s e-finance literacy has grown. The pandemic certainly had a hand in improving engagement with e-payment platforms and ecommerce, but the government’s efforts have also supported the growth through engaging older and less-privileged segments.
Alongside improving speed and efficiency of commerce, e-payment platforms provide the government with easier tracking and recording capabilities on average spending and other information.
Digitalizing government payments and receipts also benefit the country’s economy as, mentioned by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in a 2017 report, “emerging market economies [can] substantially increase revenue without raising tax rates, and eliminate tens of billions of dollars in waste and fraud”.
For businesses in and outside of FinTech and ecommerce, better financial inclusion through awareness and available POS for e-payments support growth, increase in security, and increase in profitability through more convenient and safer transactions for consumers.
