Egyptian Imports from Food Groups in Light of COVID-19: An Econometric Study

Abstract

This study aims to identify the extent to which COVID-19 impacted Egyptian imports. It includes two main sections. The first section identifies the repercussions of COVID-19 on some global and local economic indicators – especially the recession that most of the world’s economies are experiencing in light of the continuing COVID-19 outbreaks. The Egyptian economy achieved a general growth rate in 2020, at a time when the entire world was experiencing economic stagnation; this was due to the Egyptian government’s set of measures and a lack of direction towards a complete closure. The second part examines demand determinants for Egyptian imports of meat, dairy, oils, cereals, sugar and wheat using ARDL models according to the bounds testing approach to cointegration. This was accomplished by studying the extent to which dependent variables have a long-term equilibrium relationship, as well as the value of imports with lag periods, gross domestic products, relative prices, effective real exchange rates, liberalisation policies, COVID-19 effects on imports and forecasting demand for Egyptian imports. KEYWORDS ARDL-UECM, economic growth, exchange rate, relative prices, SARIMA, trade policies