Public Private Partnership: Insights from the Egyptian Experience

Abstract

Partnership between private and public organizations has become very vital for policy implementation. PPP contracts have been successful for the recent years in many countries such as United Kingdom, Germany, Netherlands, South Africa, and The United States. Egypt is considered to be one of the MENA region leaders in the PPP field. PPPs are considered to be on the top of the Egyptian economic reform agenda so as to increase the private sector involvement in public services through leveraging private sector spending against public spending. The objective of this theoretical paper is to analyze the role of public private partnership in Egypt with regards to developing meaningful cooperation between the governments and businesses in a way that enables effective provision of cost efficient quality public goods, services and facilities. The significance of the study lies in the fact that PPP has become a crucial need for the government of Egypt for rendering an efficient public services and projects amidst all the challenges for developing the country after the 25th of January Revolution.

A Disclosure Framework to Enhance Accountability and Transparency for Public-Private Partnership (PPP) in Egypt: With a Case Study

“…The study indicated that the extent and quality of voluntary information disclosed by the private construction companies was low. Samir and Maher (2018) analyzed the role of public private partnership in Egypt in terms of developing meaningful cooperation between the governments and private sector companies in a way that enables the provision of high-quality, cost-efficient public goods, services and facilities. The study indicated that there is a need to develop a common vision between both public and private entities that can be built using good governance, sound management, transparency, commitment and trust.…”

“…The partnership between the public sector and private sector has two main drivers, the first of which is the financial driver that allows the public sector to make a capital investment without incurring any loans (Samir & Maher, 2018). In many countries, the PPP scheme has been developed primarily due to financial lack of provision of public infrastructure and public services.…”

“…The skills and expertise of the private sector improve the cost of the project, thus providing value for money to the government. Throughout the concession period, the government retains control over the provision of the specified level of service (Samir & Maher, 2018). Thus, the role of the government in this case becomes only coordination with the private sector (Irimia-Diéguez & Oliver-Alfonso, 2012).…”

“…Many researchers and practitioners have described the advantages of PPP (Andon, 2012;Caperchione et al, 2017;Mohy El Din, 2017;Samir & Maher, 2018). Some of these advantages are risk transfer, better value for money, more convenient financial analysis, and enhanced public-private partnership (Helmy et al, 2020).…”

“…It should be noted that PPP carries risks due to the complexity of contracts, long-term concessions, inaccurate forecasting of investments and market demands, and uncertain operation ability of the facility and stakeholders involved in the process (Reynaers, 2013;Samir & Maher, 2018;Mayer et al, 2019;Helmy et al, 2020). All these factors create a lot of risks that must be taken into consideration when dealing with PPP projects.…”