THE IMPACT OF THE APPLICATION OF GREEN POLICIES ON THE FLOW OF DIRECT INVESTMENTS IN EGYPT

This study aims at predicting the effect of the application of Green Economy policies in Egypt, as an alternative to the traditional “Business as Usual” policies, and to assess the implications of this transformation on the ability to attract Direct Investment to the Arab Republic of Egypt. The research is limited to the energy sector. The study covers the period from 2001 to 2030, which has been chosen based on Egypt's sustainable development Vision 2030. Some focus has been devoted to the period ending 2020, the date set in February 2008 when the Supreme Council of Energy approved an ambitious plan to increase the share of renewable energy to become 20% of the energy mix by 2020. The research methodology is designed to assess the responsiveness of investor upon the enforcement of Green policy measures relevant to traditional economic policies pertinent to the sector under study.
Emphasis has been given to the Energy sector, given its direct impact on overall economic development, based on the size of the labor force employed in the sector, its contribution to Egypt's gross domestic product and its interconnectivity with almost all economic, environmental and social fields.
In assessing the implications of, the study emphasized the intertwined implications and possible overlap between economic, Environmental and Social indicators. To this end, the study relied on the documented data provided by relevant institutions and from private companies. The research adopted the questionnaires methodology to test the main hypothesis on which the research was based, namely, “There is no significant implication for investors upon the transformation to Green Economy policies that incorporates, economic, environmental and social dimensions”. To test this assumption, the research had to break it down into three “Null” sub hypothesis as follows:
1-   "There is no significant statistical relation between economic and trade policies and the investment decisions for businessmen."
2-   "There is no statistically significant relation between environmental policies and the investment decisions for business people."
3-   "There is no statistically significant relation between Social policies and the investment decisions for businessmen."
The research used the SPSS software to test the significant relation between green policies and investment decisions. It has further assessed the policies that would be mostly significant and concluded that transformation to green policy regime is of ultimate importance from economic, social and environmental perspectives, hence has provided some policy recommendations to proceed with in order for the transformation to be effective.  Moreover, the research assessed the growth rates on certain economic, environmental and social measurable variables such as, employment, poverty and reduction in CO2 emissions, after transformation to green policies has been realized. The study has shown that the average increase of the growth rates on the assessed variables ranges between 6-15% depending on the variable assessed.