Agriculture Minister Amin Abaza, in a speech before the Food Security Conference, said that Egypt imports 40 percent of its total foodstuffs and 60 percent of its wheat.

"Yet the government is keen to offset rising global food costs by allocating billions of pounds for this purpose," he said.

In an effort to help low-income citizens, the minister explained that the government had recently increased the number of ration-card beneficiaries, added more strategic goods to them--such as sugar and rice--and reduced customs duties on food needed for domestic consumption.

"The government also banned rice exports so as to meet local demand and increased bread subsidies from LE9 billion to LE21 billion," he said.

In a related development, the Local Wheat Supply Committee said the national wheat supply had been reduced by 50 percent this month because large quantities were found to be infested with insects and were therefore discarded.

Translated from the Arabic Edition.