In 2018, Egypt overtook Saudi Arabia as the region’s second largest single-project construction market, owing to a spike in demand fueled by economic recovery and entire new cities being built to alleviate congestion in downtown Cairo

In recent years, Egypt has witnessed a construction boom of epic proportions, surpassing Saudi Arabia as the region’s second largest single-projects market in 2018, valued at over $33 billion in contracts awarded. In total, Egypt has $300 billion of projects in the pipeline; only the UAE and Saudi Arabia have larger markets.

“Egypt is one of the key regional markets for the construction industry,” says Minister of Trade and Industry Amr Nassar, who inaugurated the country’s first major international construction event last year. The event underscored growth in the sector, which grew 10% the previous year, an all-time high.

Economic recovery and the need to decongest Cairo have fueled new projects. “There is a huge demand in Egypt,” says Waleed Abdel Fattah, Vice President and Managing Director of Africa for Hill International, a US construction consulting firm that is involved in two major housing projects in New Cairo, Taj City and Sarai. “Anything that the government does with infrastructure is going to be used.”

Hill International, which has worked in over 10,000 projects worth more than $500 billion, claims that investing in infrastructure is a “no-brainer” in Egypt; demand is intrinsic. Introducing best practices to manage this heavy volume is the next step. “Project management is a new concept,” he says. Having recently been awarded contracts for extensions to the Cairo Metro, Fattah adds: “Our job was to introduce a more systematic approach using the latest project management tools.” Hill International has also worked in capacity building for the Egyptian Natural Gas Holding Company (EGAS).