About Egypt
United Nations Population Fund
11th Country programme for Egypt (2023-2027)
Egypt was one of the first countries to sign an agreement with UNFPA to initiate population activities. The country office was established in 1972 and UNFPA has supported Egypt through ten 5-year country programmes ever since. The proposed programme is aligned with national development priorities outlined in Egypt’s Vision 2030 and National Population Strategy; United Nations Partnership and Development Assistance Framework (2023-2027), and builds on recommendations of the 10th country programme evaluation.
The programme aims to build on flagship Presidential initiatives – Haya Karima, a national poverty reduction initiative targeting around 5,000 of the poorest villages; and the National Project for Development of the Egyptian Family, 2022-2024.
The Country Programme aims to create an enabling policy and social environment where girls and young women’s agency is harnessed to ensure they make informed and healthy reproductive health decisions.
Egypt at a glance:
The total land size of Egypt is 1.01 million square kilometres; however, the country’s population of 103 million occupies only 8 per cent of that territory. The population dramatically increased by 31 million people over the last 15 years. The total fertility rate has not had a steady trajectory, fluctuating from 3 children per women in 2008 to 3.5 in 2014, and has now dropped to 2.85 following the nationwide family-planning campaigns and development of strategies such as women’s empowerment. According to the common country analysis 2021, women’s fertility rates are higher in rural areas, with rural Upper Egypt accounting for 25 per cent of the population and 41 per cent of all births (2014). Adolescent girls living in rural areas also tend to marry earlier, compared to their peers in urban areas, coupled with higher poverty rates, which reach 60 per cent in rural Upper Egypt, and lower numbers of years of schooling for both men and women.
Egypt has made significant strides towards realizing the three UNFPA transformative results. The maternal mortality ratio has decreased over the years, dropping from 174 per 100,000 live births in 1992 to 54 in 2010, and, most recently, 42.8 per 100,000 live births in 2019. However, recent government data suggest that the COVID-19 pandemic has negatively impacted the maternal mortality ratio, with an expected national increase to 49 per 100,000 live births in 2020. The maternal mortality ratio is highest in the border governorates of North Sinai at 82 and Matrouh at 61 per 100,000 live births, respectively.
According to the Egyptian Family Health Survey 2021, the national contraceptive prevalence rate is 66.4 per cent and the national rate of unmet need for family planning services is 13.8 per cent. According to the last available disaggregated data of the Demographic Health Survey 2014, the contraceptive prevalence rate is lowest in Upper Egypt, in the governorates of Sohag (31 per cent) and Qena (37.8 per cent), while in Cairo it is at 64 per cent. Of concern is the contraceptive prevalence rate among younger age groups, which is significantly lower (39 per cent for married women aged 15-19-years and 52.3 per cent for those aged 20-24 years) as per the Egyptian Family Health Survey 2021. Spacing between pregnancies is less than two years among 69 per cent of married women aged 15-19 years and 26 per cent for those aged 20-24. Disparities in the maternal mortality rate and unmet need for family planning between rural and urban governorates, and among different age groups, suggest that there are gaps in quality of care, as well as deeply rooted gender and social norms that disempower rural and younger women; these need to be addressed. Therefore, younger age groups fall among the most at risk of unwanted pregnancies, repeated pregnancies with minimal spacing, leading to increased maternal mortality and morbidity.
Accordingly, the country program has four outputs:
Output 1: By 2027, youth, in particular girls’ agency and human capital are strengthened to enable them to make informed choices and realize their full potential
Accelerators
Partnerships
South-South and triangular cooperation
Innovative financing
Key Strategies
- Lead a national program on girl empowerment under First Lady
- Roll out the Girls Assets Framework by building the social, health and economic assets of adolescent girls
- Creating linkages between maternal health, reproductive health and family planning, gender-based violence against women and girls and harmful practices and economic empowerment programs
- Building youth skills knowledge and capacities
- Employing innovation through incubators and accelerators
Output 2: By 2027, capabilities and capacities of actors and institutions are strengthened to promote gender equality and expand a zero-tolerance environment towards all forms of gender-based violence against women and girls
Accelerators
Partnerships
South-South and triangular cooperation on international good practices
Key Strategies
- Scaling up the engagement of local civil society organizations and community-based organizations
- Expanding the engagement of religious and community leaders
- Engaging men and boys
- Employing interactive modes of engagement
- Increasing the integration of age-appropriate population education
- Expanding multimedia and behavioral change campaigns
Output 3: By 2027, the capacities of national systems, including local institutions, are strengthened to provide quality, comprehensive and inclusive reproductive health-care services and information, as well as services addressing gender-based violence against women and girls and harmful practices
Accelerators
Partnerships
South-South and triangular cooperation
Public-private coordination
Innovation and digitalization of resources
Key Strategies
- Building the capacities of service providers
- Addressing healthcare malpractices especially on harmful practices
- Improving human, technical and institutional capacity of the family planning national supply chain
- Relying on Learning Management Systems (LMS) and the digitalization of learning material
- Strengthening and expanding adolescents and youth-friendly health-care services
- Improving local and specialized response services on gender-based violence against women and girls and harmful practices
- Working with domestic violence and child marriage survivors on reintegration
- Increasing community awareness of available services
Output 4: Institutions, including local institutions, are strengthened through better interministerial coordination, improved monitoring and evaluation systems, digital transformation, enhanced statistical capacities allowing for evidence-based policymaking and implementation, and through the implementation of SDG-driven financing mechanisms
Accelerators
Data and evidence.
Leaving no one behind
Resilience in adaption
Innovation and digitization
Key Strategies
- Developing investment cases, including for adolescent girls, aimed at increasing public investment
- Developing national frameworks for national strategies
- Addressing legislative gaps, institutional mechanisms to address medical malpractices
- Engaging with international and regional human rights mechanisms
- Ensuring multi-sectoral coordination of services
- Availability of age and sex-disaggregated data
- Carrying out quantitative and qualitative research
- Enhancing local governance and accountability
