The country’s plan to attract Gulf students to Egyptian universities and set up universities in the GCC is undergoing a rethink. With war in the region potentially delaying short-term plans to open up Egyptian university branches in the GCC and complicating its enrollment of students from the Gulf, the Higher Education Ministry is looking to its African neighbors to preempt a possible drop in the number of students if the war continues, two government officials tell EnterpriseAM.

To do this, the government is thinking about upping its outreach by promoting its education offerings and using its cultural offices around the world. A push to offer programs aligned with international labor market needs — with a focus on technology — is expected to help. This type of outreach has already proven to work, with the current academic year witnessing first-time enrollments from Burundi, Mauritius, Guinea, and Comoros, as well as Brazil and Australia, while numbers from Mauritania and Niger have been growing.

The ministry is also working to ease admission procedures to encourage an uptick in enrollment, with measures approved to recognize more foreign credentials, standardize services offered to foreign students across public universities, and build up the country’s Study in Egypt platform with more courses and universities. Graduates of Egyptian universities will also be offered scholarships, amendments will be made to EgyAid to promote cultural exchange programs, and Arabic language assessments for non-native speakers will be standardized.

Egypt may be able to find other interested students from different geographies, but the question is whether they will be able to match the spending power of students from the Gulf. While the average gross national income per capita was USD 77.3k in Qatar, USD 51.6k in the UAE, and USD 35.6k in Saudi Arabia in 2024, according to data from the World Bank, the average in sub-Saharan Africa for the year was just USD 1.6k.

But some think the war could actually increase students’ interest in studying in Egypt, with safety concerns — warranted or not — persuading a segment of students that usually study in Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Kuwait to instead study in Egypt, one of the government officials argued. However, for this to happen, Egypt needs to be proactive in attracting them, we were told.

Why this matters: International students are becoming a key source of hard currency, which matters more than ever with further declining Suez Canal revenues and a big question mark about the trajectory of tourism and remittance inflows over the next period, especially if the war continues for months.

By the numbers: Egypt succeeded in attracting 450k international university students in 2025, up from 125k in 2023, one of the government officials tells us. Arab students account for a large proportion of this, which has been supported by a growing number of international universities and foreign branches of international universities operating in the country, in addition to the breadth of courses offered by the country’s many universities. Alexandria University alone hosts some 70k international students, another source from the sector told us.

Even if we succeed in attracting international students, the country’s push to open up Egyptian universities abroad could be delayed, we were told. While Cairo University and Alexandria University’s new branches in Abu Dhabi and Ajman opened their doors this academic year, further expansion plans by Egyptian universities in the UAE, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia could be delayed if political instability continues in the region, along with travel difficulties. Malaysia could also see delays as a knock-on effect, we were told.

It’s always good to plan ahead, but we may be jumping the gun here, one of the government officials argued. We’re only entering the third week of the war, and we’re still some months out from applications opening up in July for international students looking to study here in the next academic year.

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