‘There are no dollars’: foreign currency crunch hits Egypt’s economy

With foreign currency in short supply in Egypt, Rafik Clovis spent December anxiously waiting to find out whether his bank would be able to provide the $67,000 he needed to fund the import of a consignment of car parts from Europe.

But by the end of the year, the dollars were still not available; as a result, his imports in 2022 were just a tenth of a normal year’s amount.

“Conditions are catastrophic,” Clovis said. “There are no…