Egypt’s upcoming oil and gas agreement with the EU and the World Bank’s latest Economic Outlook report dominated the conversation on the airwaves last night (we have chapter and verse on both in the Speed Round, below).

Egypt is expecting the results of seismic scans of the Red Sea back by the end of June in order to determine the blocks it intends to tender off to oil and gas exploration before the year is up, Oil Minister Tarek El Molla told Hona Al Asema’s Lamees Al Hadidi in phone-in. The border demarcation agreement with Saudi Arabia has opened up more exploration opportunities in the Red Sea, he also said, adding that structural and legislative reforms — such as the Natural Gas Act — have helped attract sizeable investments to the sector (watch, runtime: 41:18).

Egypt will pay back a large of chunk of its arrears to international oil companies in less than two months’ time, El Molla also said, adding that the ministry intends to clear its obligations to IOCs completely in about two years (watch, runtime: 1:30).

The ministry is still planning to implement further gradual subsidy cuts to bring down its costs, Oil Ministry spokesman Hamdy Abdel Aziz told Al Hayah Al Youm’s Tamer Amin (watch, runtime: 2:46).

Finance Minister Amr El Garhy also offered Lamees his two cents on the World Bank’s Economic Outlook report, which sees Egypt’s GDP growth rate climbing to 5% this year. Speaking from Washington, DC, El Garhy said that the report sees unemployment dropping to 11.1% this fiscal year and sinking lower to 9.7% in the next. He confirmed that an IMF delegation is due in Cairo in May to review progress on economic reform before disbursing a USD 2 bn tranche of Egypt’s USD 12 bn extended fund facility (watch, runtime: 8:58).

The report is generally “positive” and reflects the strength in investments and improvements in exports as well as tourism, former Banque Misr deputy chairman Sahar El Damaty told Sherif Amer on Yahduth fi Misr. Amer pointed out that the report sees inflation at 14% by the end of 2018 compared to government projections of around 13% (watch, runtime: 5:56).

MPs will be meeting with the ministers of finance and planning to discuss the FY2018-19 budget, Parliament’s Budget Committee chair Omar Yasser told Amer. The budget is Egypt’s largest to-date, according to MP Mohamed Badrawy (watch, runtime: 4:12), but it still does not factor in the full cost of Egypt’s long-awaited educational reform plan, Omar noted (watch, runtime: 2:03).

Education Minister Tarek Shawky promised change for the better on last night’s Kol Youm to discuss the five-year educational reform strategy. He told Amr Adib that parents should trust the ministry in its plans to overhaul the system and do away with Thanaweya Amma, adding that the government is aware of the obstacles ahead (watch, runtime: 1:19).

Meanwhile, Sophia the robot made an appearance on Masaa DMC for a chat with host Osama Kamal. Proceed at your own risk (watch, runtime: 12:23).