President Abdel Fattah El-Sisi has ordered the allocation of approximately 41,500 acres—more than 174 million square meters—of land in Egypt’s Red Sea governorate to the Ministry of Finance.
The decree, published Tuesday in the Official Gazette and dated June 4, grants the Ministry of Finance ownership of the specified land, which falls under state-owned private property. According to the decree, the land is to be used to reduce Egypt’s public debt and to issue sovereign bonds under the relevant laws and regulations.
A plot of land allocated to the Ministry of Finance.The presidential order also stipulates that the Armed Forces will retain ownership of any strategically important military sites within the designated area.
According to ministry's data for fiscal year 2023/24, Egypt’s public debt-to-GDP ratio stands at 89.4%. The government’s debt service obligations, including both domestic and foreign debt, will reach about 2 trillion Egyptian pounds (about $40.4 billion) in the upcoming fiscal year starting in July.
In April, the Minister of Finance Ahmed Kouchouk told Reuters that the government plans to issue $2 billion in sukuk in 2025 as part of a broader strategy to issue bonds in local currency for the first time, diversifying Egypt’s debt portfolio and reducing financial risk.
Sukuk, or Islamic bonds, they are a type of debt instrument often backed by specific assets. For example, Talaat Moustafa Group issued a 2 billion pound (about $40.4 million) sukuk tied to its Madinaty Mall.
In 2023, the Ministry of Finance issued its first U.S. dollar-denominated sukuk, raising $1.5 billion at a yield of nearly 11%, which added to the burden of external debt.
The Ministry of Finance has yet to announce how the newly allocated Red Sea land might be used as collateral in future sukuk offerings.
