page_title: Economy of Egypt
section_title: Mineral and energy resources
hierarchical_section_title: Economy of Egypt / Natural resources / Mineral and energy resources
caption_attribution_description: English: US EIA OIl Production and Consumption annual
context_page_description: The economy of Egypt was a highly centralized economy focused on import substitution under president Gamal Abd EL-Nasser. In the 1990s, a series of International Monetary Fund arrangements, coupled with massive external debt relief resulting from Egypt's participation in the Gulf War coalition, helped Egypt improve its macroeconomic performance.
  Since 2000, the pace of structural reforms, including fiscal, monetary policies, taxation, privatisation and new business legislations, helped Egypt move towards a more market-oriented economy and prompted increased foreign investment. The reforms and policies have strengthened macroeconomic annual growth results which averaged 8% annually between 2004 and 2009 but the government largely failed to equitably share the wealth and the benefits of growth have failed to trickle down to improve economic conditions for the broader population, especially with the growing problem of unemployment and underemployment.
context_section_description: Egypt's mineral and energy resources include petroleum, natural gas, phosphates, gold and iron ore. Crude oil is found primarily in the Gulf of Suez and in the Western Desert. Natural gas is found mainly in the Nile Delta, off the Mediterranean shore, and in the Western Desert. Oil and gas accounted for approximately 7% of GDP in fiscal year 2000/01.
  Export of petroleum and related products amounted to $2.6 billion in the year 2000. In late 2001, Egypt's benchmark "Suez Blend" was about $16.73 per barrel ($105/m³), the lowest price since 1999.
  Crude oil production has been in decline for several years since its peak level in 1993, from 941,000 bbl/d (149,600 m³/d) in 1993 to 873,000 bbl/d (138,800 m³/d) in 1997 and to 696,000 bbl/d (110,700 m³/d) in 2005. (See Figure). At the same time, the domestic consumption of oil increased steadily (531,000 bbl/d (84,400 m³/d) and 525,000 bbl/d (83,500 m³/d) in 1997 and 2005 respectively), but in 2008, oil consumption reached to 697,000 bbl/d (110,800 m³/d). It is easy to see from the graph that a linear trend projects that domestic demand outpaced supply in (2008–2009), turning Egypt to a net importer of oil. To minimize this potential, the government of Egypt has been encouraging the exploration, production and domestic consumption of natural gas. Oil Production was 630 bbl/d (100 m³/d) in 2008, and natural gas output continued to increase and reached 48.3 billion cubic meters in 2008.
  Domestic resources meet only about 33% of Egypt's domestic demand, meaning large imports from Saudi Arabia, UAE and Iraq are necessary.
  Over the last 15 years, more than 180 petroleum exploration agreements have been signed and multinational oil companies spent more than $27 billion in exploration companions. These activities led to the findings of about 18 crude oil fields and 16 natural gas fields in FY 2001. The total number of findings rose to 49 in FY 2005. As a result of these findings, crude oil reserves as of 2009 are estimated at 3.7 billion barrels (590,000,000 m³), and proven natural gas reserves are 1.656 trillion cubic meters with likely additional discoveries with more exploration campaigns.
  In August 2007, it was announced that signs of oil reserves in Kom Ombo basin, about 28 miles (45 km) north of Aswan, was found and a concession agreement was signed with Centorion Energy International for drilling. The main natural gas producer in Egypt is the International Egyptian Oilfield Company (IEOC), a branch of Italian Eni. Other companies like BP, BG, Texas-based Apache Corp. and Shell carry out activities of exploration and production by means of concessions granted for a period of generally ample time (often 20 years) and in different geographic zones of oil and gas deposits in the country.
  Gold mining is more recently a fast-growing industry with vast untapped gold reserves in the Eastern Desert. To develop this nascent sector the Egyptian government took a first step by awarding mineral concessions, in what was considered the first international bid round. Two miners who have produced encouraging technical results include AngloGold Ashanti and Alexander Nubia International.
  Gold production facilities are now reality from the Sukari Hills, located close to Marsa Alam in the Eastern Desert. The concession of the mine was granted to Centamin, an Australian joint stock company, with a gold exploitation lease for a 160-square-kilometer area. Sami El-Raghy, Centamin chairman, has repeatedly stated that he believes Egypt's yearly revenues from gold in the future could exceed the total revenues from the Suez Canal, tourism and the petroleum industry.
  The Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources has established expanding the Egyptian petrochemical industry and increasing exports of natural gas as its most significant strategic objectives and in 2009 about 38% of local gas production was exported.
  As of 2009, most Egyptian gas exports (approximately 70%) are delivered in the form of liquefied natural gas (LNG) by ship to Europe and the United States. Egypt and Jordan agreed to construct the 
caption: Egypt's oil consumption is overtaking oil production.
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