Cairo- Today, Egyptian families are experiencing a state of increasing anxiety about the possibility of canceling ration cards, which are the lifeline of millions of citizens to meet their basic needs, especially in light of the difficult economic conditions and the increase in the prices of subsidized basic services.
The statements of the rapporteur of the Investment Committee of the National Dialogue (governmental), Dr. Samir Sabry, about the existence of a “screening” process for ration cards, sparked great concern among citizens, who fear losing this vital support.
Sabry pointed out that the ration cards were screened (liquidated) more than once during the past years and the number of beneficiaries decreased to 60 million instead of 70 million. Despite this, he believes that all the current numbers do not deserve support, which has raised concerns among citizens about the deletion criteria that may be applied in the future.
Standards for keeping a ration card in Egypt
Among these controversial criteria are the presence of air conditioning in the home, the consumption of a certain number of kilowatts of electricity, home internet consumption, the number of mobile phones in each family, and the number of cars or property owned.
Since 2016, the Egyptian government has imposed so-called special criteria to scrutinize and audit the numbers of those eligible for support and to tighten them by narrowing the criteria and filtering out those eligible for support and deleting them from the ration cards on an ongoing basis. It has succeeded in deleting more than 10 million individuals and placing obstacles in the way of registering new beneficiaries despite the deteriorating economic conditions.
Among those strict criteria are the deletion of:
- Who gets a monthly salary of about 10 thousand pounds (about 200 dollars now).
- Who has a car model 2014 or newer.
- Those whose electricity consumption exceeds 650 kilowatts.
- Who pays school fees for one of his children of 30 thousand pounds or more (about 600 dollars only).
With the Egyptian pound declining in value and the cost of living rising, millions of families rely on ration cards to provide for their basic needs.
What does the state provide in terms of supplies in Egypt?
- 50 pounds (about one dollar) per citizen per month for 4 people per card.
- For more than 4 people, 25 pounds will be charged per person.
- Providing subsidized bread at a rate of 5 loaves per citizen per day at a value of 20 piasters per loaf.
How much does the subsidy cost the Egyptian government budget?
The current fiscal year 2024-2025 budget includes financial allocations to support food commodities worth about 134 billion pounds (about 2.7 billion dollars), up from 127 billion pounds (4 billion dollars at the dollar price at the time) compared to last year, and was as follows:
- 91 billion pounds to support the loaf of bread.
- 36 billion pounds to support ration cards.
More than two-thirds of the Egyptian population, about 110 million people, benefit from bread and food subsidies as follows:
- 69.5 million individuals benefit from bread support.
- 61.8 Number of individuals benefiting from food commodity support.
Ration card standards under the microscope
In light of these concerns, Dr. Amr Madkour, Advisor to the Minister of Supply for Information Systems and Digital Transformation, confirmed that “there are no new criteria for deletion from ration cards at the present time.” They are all proposals, some of which are acceptable and some of which are unacceptable, some of which are possible and some of which are not possible.
He added in an interview with Al Jazeera Net that the process of scrutinizing and purifying ration cards is ongoing through updating databases, especially since purifying databases or integrating state databases is a subject under careful study.
Madkour stressed that any amendment to the standards will take into consideration that it is in accordance with fair rules that are acceptable to society and are consistent with the citizen’s condition, and the recent economic developments resulting from the amendment of the pound’s exchange rate will undoubtedly be taken into account.
On the sidelines of his tour of Fayoum Governorate, Minister of Supply and Internal Trade Sherif Farouk revealed that no new standards have been set yet, and that the social justice standards have already been announced.
The Egyptian government had threatened to remove from the supply those who steal electricity, and the Ministry of Electricity announced that the data of 300,000 electricity thieves had been sent to the Ministry of Supply and Internal Trade, in preparation for lifting the subsidy from them.
In order to reduce the subsidy bill and save about 13.5 billion pounds ($275 million), the Egyptian government increased, for the first time in 3 decades, the price of a loaf of subsidized bread from 5 piasters to 20 piasters, an increase of 300%, effective from the first of June.
Warnings
Mahmoud Al-Asqalani, head of the Citizens Against High Prices Association, warned of the consequences of any decision related to expanding the criteria for deletion from ration cards, and said: “Approaching this file at this time is dangerous, which makes me warn the government against that or what I call ‘free’ anger. The money that the state will save is not worth the consequences of increasing the anger of the street.”
He explained, in his interview with Al Jazeera Net, that there are many reasons for this warning, including that a large part of the middle class has been eroded and another part is resisting the erosion, and a part of the poor classes have become “oppressed” as a result of the recent economic conditions. Therefore, Al-Asqalani added, we are facing changes in the social ladder that may cause some form of unrest by accumulation in the near future or in the medium term.
He continued: Based on the pulse of the street and the erosion of citizens’ savings, we call on the government to be patient and focus on improving the conditions of citizens and passing through the economic crisis, especially since the prices of basic services such as electricity, fuel, water and transportation have increased more than once.
Poverty reigns supreme in Egypt
The poverty rate in Egypt reached 29.7% in the latest census issued by the Central Agency for Public Mobilization and Statistics in 2020, and an independent study conducted by the agency’s consultant, Heba Al-Leithy, expected the poverty level to rise to 35.7% in 2022-2023.
Some expect the poverty rate to exceed these figures, in light of the absence of any new official figures being announced, after about two years of the worst economic crisis the country has ever experienced, which resulted in the collapse of the pound from 15.7 pounds to about 49 pounds, and the doubling of the prices of all fees and services by rates of no less than 100%.
