Cairo – Mubasher: Egypt has the largest education system across its multiple stages in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), PwC said in a recent report entitled “Understanding Middle East Education”, focusing on the Arab nation’s education system.
The total enrolment at the K-12 level reached 20.6 million in the North African nation during the academic year 2016/2017, the leading professional services firm added, citing data released by Egyptian state-run statistics agency CAPMAS.
Meanwhile, total enrolment at the Higher Education (HE) level amounted to 2.4 million students, official data showed.
Around 90% of K-12 students and 94% of HE students in Egypt attended public schools or universities during the 2016-2017 academic year, the report highlighted.
Up to 900,000 seats may be needed for students enrolling in higher education institutions by 2021, it added.
The London-based company ascribed the increase in demand to the rise in tertiary aged population by 400,000, in addition to a nonstop improvement in HE participation rate.
As for the private sector, the primary, preparatory, and secondary stages only constitute 10% of total enrolment, according to CAPMAS recent data.
However, enrolment in private schools is growing at a faster rate than that of public schools with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 4% recorded between 2013 and 2017, CAPMAS said.
“Assuming full capacity of existing provision, and without any fundamental changes to school delivery models, PwC estimates the number of nearly 2.4 million seats for grades 1-12 will be needed by FY 2022/23,” Sally Jeffery, Global Education and Skills Network leader at PwC Middle East and co-author of the report, commented.
PwC revealed that Egypt is on its way to build a private education sector due to the sustainable demand for education on the back of steady population growth.
“Although there is a strong reliance on the government as the main education provider in Egypt, the outcomes aren’t good and unemployment rates even for graduates are very high. With continuing demographic growth, Egypt’s education sector represents one of the most pressing and therefore one of the most attractive opportunities for investors in the region,” Jeffery added.
It is worth mentioning that Egypt was ranked among the top performing economies in enrolment particularly at the primary level, according to the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness report released for the academic year 2017/2018.
“Egypt’s future prosperity relies heavily on its citizens receiving a high-quality education that prepares them for life in a rapidly changing economic environment and social setting,” PwC stated.
