Last night proved to be a busy evening on the airwaves: Diplomacy, food security, an oil find in the Gulf of Suez, and the ongoing Brics summit all received coverage.

The Brics debate: Coinciding with the opening of the Brics summit in South Africa yesterday, Ala Mas’ouleety’s Ahmed Moussa invited several economists into the studio to discuss what we can expect from the summit, whether the organization will be able to challenge the G7’s geopolitical dominance, and what it would mean for Egypt to become a member. The consensus: it will be long before we see the bloc pose serious competition to the current world order (watch runtime: 59:23).

What’s in it for Egypt? With Egypt among the 20 countries that have formally applied to join the bloc, a large part of the conversation focused on the potential benefits of becoming a member. Entering the Brics would gradually wean Egypt off the greenback, bring in more investments from member states, allow us to enter into foreign partnerships in local currency, and get loans at better terms especially considering our joining of the Brics bank, banking expert Sahar El Damaty told Moussa (watch, runtime: 59:22).

And what’s in it for them? The other Brics members would benefit from Egypt’s strategic geographical location, economic expert Mohamed Shady told Masaa DMC (watch, runtime: 10:37). None of the current member states have any objections to Egypt’s entry but the bloc still needs time to evaluate the economic impact of the potential expansion, shady added.

Boosting local wheat production: Masaa DMC (watch, runtime: 4:22) and Ala Mas’ouleety (watch, runtime: 4:42) both covered President Abdel Fattah El Sisi’s instructions to the prime minister and the agriculture minister yesterday to increase the supply of fertilizer and equipment to farmers. In an interview on Ala Mas’ouleety, Agriculture Ministry spokesman Mohamed El Kersh said that it had obtained around 240k tons of fertilizer to support planting 4 mn feddans of wheat. In a speech at the weekend, El Sisi said the government would begin cultivating another 3 mn feddans in the coming months.

ALSO GETTING ATTENTION ON THE AIRWAVES-

  • Cheiron strikes oil: Masaa DMC (watch, runtime: 8:55) and Al Hayah Al Youm (watch, runtime: 2:02) both covered yesterday’s news that Cheiron Energy has discovered oil in the Gulf of Suez. We have more in this morning’s Also on our Radar, below.
  • Sisi x El Safadi: Masaa DMC (watch, runtime: 4:22) gave airtime to President Abdel Fattah El Sisi’s meeting with the Jordanian foreign minister yesterday. More on that, below.
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