After concluding its 11th edition and concurrent with Egypt’s hosting the COP27 .. Attracting capital investments and increasing awareness for local green projects were some of the most prominent highlights of the event
Cairo, 03 November 2022- Informa Markets Egypt, the leading company in the field of international tradeshows and exhibitions, discloses the most featured highlights of the 11th Cityscape Egypt Conference, held in September 2022. The conference was attended by businessmen, heads of real estate development companies, government officials, media representatives, and industry experts.
Eng. Fathallah Fawzy, Chairman of the Cityscape Egypt Conference, said “The conference included several important sessions pertaining to the development and advancement of the real estate sector in Egypt. It is thanks to various large-scale development projects undertaken by the Egyptian government, particularly the New Administrative Capital, and New Alamein on the North Coast, that the real estate sector is seeing one of the brightest moments in its recent history. These projects have also served to attract many new foreign investors”.
The various workshops, panel discussions, presentations, and research that took place over the two consecutive days of the conference, witnessed excellent engagement between officials and experts in the real estate sector and showed a keenness to advance the real estate development and investment industry in Egypt to new heights.
The conference’s main findings and conclusions revolved around Egypt’s hosting of the 27th United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change’s “Conference of the Parties” or COP27, as a major hub to attract capital and raise awareness of green and sustainable projects in Egypt. Furthermore, it was concluded that more cooperation between the public and private sectors is necessary to ensure the establishment of accurate KPIs which will contribute to improving confidence in the Egyptian real estate market.
Industry experts also highlighted the importance of creating a safe environment for real estate investments through a stable legislative infrastructure, free of surprises, by involving key stakeholders from the sector during discussions prior to the issuance of new laws. This is in addition to reassessing special laws for the establishment of real estate funds to be compatible and in line with global real estate funds and granting incentives to funds operating in the Health and Educational services. They also emphasized the importance of the state applying green city standards in new cities and activating the “Green Pyramids” applications in all the new projects it is developing, in addition to motivating developers to apply sustainability standards and incorporate new academic scientific research findings in their new projects.
Real estate industry experts also suggested raising awareness regarding the insulation code in residential buildings, due to its impact on energy conservation and working to activate the laws related to its application, plus ensuring its implementation across the entire social spectrum.
Another key point that was discussed is the need to develop a comprehensive plan for the development of historical buildings in Cairo and other governorates. This will entail close coordination between the Central Bank and the Union of Banks to lay the foundations and controls for financing these projects for developers and to provide real estate financing for buyers. As a result, it will be imperative to turn to independent financial experts to prepare financial studies and analyses before accepting funding requests for these projects.
Industry experts also called for the expedited completion of legal studies to address the relationship between building owners and tenants under the “old laws” to maximize the use of real estate assets of historical buildings and apply asset management and maintenance companies to ensure the collection of maintenance and management fees, to protect Egypt’s heritage architectural sites. They also highlighted the need to provide basic services and to promote job opportunities in the new cities that are being developed to accelerate the achievement of the target occupancy rates, in addition to the expedited completion of the national real estate number system for documenting real estate assets which will serve to facilitate trading in real estate and the issuance of building permits.
Finally, industry experts stressed the urgent need to end the obstacles of issuing licenses for ongoing projects in the New Administrative Capital and to be diligent in the application of international standards of measurement by public and private sector companies in real estate investment data to increase transparency and encourage foreign investments. Moreover, as part of this initiative, international standards for measurement need to be introduced into the educational curricula of the faculties of engineering in Egyptian universities.
At the conclusion of the conference, the delegates stressed the role of the private sector in achieving the urban development goals in Egypt’s Vision 2030. The conference’s recommendations were then presented to government officials on urban development, with the aim of continuing communication to ensure that the required changes are achieved and to present what has been achieved at the Cityscape Conference next year, with the hope that Informa Markets organizes this important event annually to help the Egyptian real estate development industry achieve maximum possible advancement.