Prime Minister Mostafa Madbouly witnessed the signature of a contract allocating a land for establishing the largest refinery and petrochemicals complex in Ain Al-Sokhna, at the Suez Canal economic zone (SCZONE), with investments worth $7.5 billion, a press release reported.

The contract has been signed between Chairman of Suez Industrial Development Company (SIDC), Abdel Nasser Al Refaee, and Managing Director of Red Sea National Refining and Petrochemical Company, in attendance of the Minister of Petroleum and Mineral Resources, Tarek El Molla and Head of General Authority of SCZONE, Yehia Zaki.

The project aims to meet domestic market needs of value-added petroleum and petrochemical products such as poly ethylene, poly propylene, polyester and ship fuel. It also targets to localize this industry and thus minimize state’s imports of such materials.

In this regard, El Molla emphasized the significance of this project for Egypt and its regional position in this industry as it will help stopping importin these products and rather convert them to exports, which in will save foreign currency and provide job opportunities.

For his part, Zaki said that this project came in line with the country’s strategy to meet the local market needs of petroleum and petrochemical products as well as the economic strategy of SCZONE 2020/2025, which looks forward to converting Al-Sokhna into an international platform for petrochemical industry.