(Wednesday, June 27, 2012)
Social justice requires creating jobs to maximize collective shares in the fruits of economic growth and to increase wages in line with productivity towards achieving higher standards of living for the wider majority of Egyptians. Mobilizing additional demand for labor through increasing the job content of growth, investing in education and training, and increasing efficiency to close the gap between demand and supply in the labor market are top priorities. Within the new economic and social paradigm, it is important to determine how various stakeholders can contribute to achieve the desired goals. While the role of the state as a regulator and facilitator is clear, less clear is the role of the private sector during the transitional era that Egypt is going through. The challenge is how can all parties align their efforts in the short and medium term to avoid the low growth scenario and its potential negative implications.
This roundtable focused on the inclusive growth model and explore ways to achieve social justice via broader participation in production and economic activity. Specifically, it aimed to contribute to ongoing debate about ways of increasing the job content of growth by addressing industrial policies, reforming education and ensuring broader support for SMEs to maximize the shares in growth benefits among various participants in the production process.