A mission of five Italian organic companies visited Cairo on June 9-10 for a workshop organized by Italian Federation of Organic and Biodynamic Agriculture (Federbio) and the Italian Trade Commission (ICE) in Cairo, which was followed by a visit to major local supermarkets.

During the workshop, the visiting companies (CANOVA S.r.l., CON BIO S.r.l., FOOD COMMERCE S.r.l., PROBIOS S.r.l, RUSTICHELLA D’ABRUZZO S.p.A.) met 62 Egyptian main players, including importers, large retailers and restaurants, totaling some 220 B2B meetings.

After the workshop, which took place in Semiramis Intercontinental Hotel in Cairo, ICE also organized a round table which allowed to exchange information and ideas on evolution of organic farming in Egypt, which showed that the main obstacle for developing organic agriculture in the Country is the lack of a comprehensive legislation on quality product certification.

Indeed, only 2% of the Egyptian production of fruit and vegetables is organic, although Egypt is a major fresh produce exporting country (worth over 1.5 billion Euro in 2009).

Speakers at the round Table included Dr. Giuseppe Francesco Panetta representing Federbio, Dr. Ihab Abdelrahman, Egyptian representative of the Mediterranean Institute of Certification (IMC), the association ECOA-Egyptian Center of Organic Agriculture, representatives of the Ministry of Agriculture and Faculty of Agriculture at Cairo University, in addition to major local companies (Agrofood, Mafa, Isis).

This has led to an interesting exchange of views on the possibility of joint actions to be undertaken in the field of training for both the Egyptian traders and the final consumer, in order to educate to consumption of organic products.

The mission in Egypt ended with a meeting with Mr. Youssry Tenawi, Director of the Chamber of Food, and visits to major local supermarket chains (Metro, Alfa, Carrefour) meeting their purchasing managers.

Italy is Egypt's third largest supplier (after USA and China, and first among European countries) and the second largest customer (after the U.S.), with a surplus balance of trade exceeding one billion Euro in 2009.