PM — Make veggies your stress cravings

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. It’s another reasonably brisk news afternoon here in Omm El Donia, with a little bit of everything from subsidy policy to diplomacy to keep us busy.

THE BIG STORIES TODAY

#1- Renewed price cap for unsubsidized bread from bakeries that use GASC flour: The government reintroduced a price cap for unsubsidized bread for a month in a ministerial decree issued yesterday, for those bakeries that will take state grain buyer GASC up on its offer of flour amid reports that the private sector is struggling to get its wheat shipments through ports. The decision sets a higher price ceiling than the one first introduced in March. A 75-gram loaf of baladi bread will now sell at EGP 1. Prices for fino bread are now set between EGP 0.75 and EGP 1.00 for loaves weighing 40-60 grams, according to the decision. Egypt first set a price cap for unsubsidized bread in March for three months in a bid to hold down local prices amid surging global inflation on the back of the crisis in Ukraine. The decision will come into effect once it’s published in the Official Gazette.

#2- Washington blocks another USD 75 mn in military aid: We won’t be receiving another USD 75 mn of military aid from the US after Democratic Senator Patrick Leahy blocked the aid’s disbursal, citing human rights concerns, Reuters reports. Leahy, who heads the Senate Appropriations Committee, rejected an assessment by the State Department that the aid should be sent to Egypt in exchange for progress on releasing political detainees. Washington typically earmarks some USD 1.3 bn in annual military aid for Egypt. The State Department withheld USD 130 mn of military aid in September over human rights concerns.

THE BIG STORY ABROAD

UK hits CTRL-Z on tax plans to restore investor confidence + calm the markets: Newly-appointed UK Chancellor Jeremy Hunt is reversing the vast majority of his predecessor’s proposed tax cuts and cutting energy subsidies, as the country looks to stymie a meltdown in its markets and currency. The announcement led to a market rally and a jump in the GBP against the USD. The story is on the front pages of the Financial Times, Reuters, CNBC, and the Wall Street Journal.

HAPPENING NOW-

EGX boss Rami El Dokany is currently heading to the UAE to kick off a roadshow in Dubai and Abu Dhabi aimed at drumming up interest in EGX-listed companies, an EGX source told Enterprise. The bourse has tapped Al Ahly Pharos to help manage the roadshow, which is set to see El Dokany meet with as many as 100 regional and international financial institutions, the source said.

Supreme Council for Vehicle Manufacturing gets preliminary House nod: The House of Representatives’ general assembly gave preliminary approval to a draft bill that would establish the Supreme Council for Vehicle Manufacturing, which would act as a regulatory body setting policies for EV assembly in Egypt, Al Mal reports. The draft bill would, if passed, also set up a new EV finance fund in a bid to localize the industry.

House speaker invites CBE, AgriMin to discuss poultry feed crisis: House Speaker Hanafi Gebali invited representatives from the Central Bank of Egypt, Agriculture Ministry, and other relevant ministries to attend a House Agriculture Committee meeting tomorrow on the poultry feed shortage, according to Al Mal.

** CATCH UP QUICK on the top stories from today’s EnterpriseAM:

• Student lifeline Selah El Telmeez is going to have a new majority owner: EFG Hermes and the Sovereign Fund of Egypt’s education management firm Egypt Education Platform has inked an agreement to acquire an undisclosed majority stake in education platform Selah El Telmeez.
• Expats could send some EGP 50 bn (c. USD 2.5 bn) into Egypt under a cabinet program that will allow Egyptians living abroad to buy new cars in exchange for hard currency, Finance Minister Mohamed Maait said.
• The House yesterday approved in principle amendments to the Agriculture Act that would introduce harsher penalties for illegally building on agricultural land.

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Take our EV survey: Are you an ex-petrolhead shopping around for your first electric vehicle? EV-curious and wondering what all the fuss is about? Or are you not ready to say goodbye to that sweet smell of benzene as you wait at the gas station?

We want to hear from you: We’re taking the pulse on how the nation feels about Egypt’s nascent EV transition. Take a few minutes to fill out our short survey. We’ll be back soon with the results.

***

???? CIRCLE YOUR CALENDAR-

The Suez Canal Economic Zone (SCZone) will launch a promotional campaign ahead of COP27 on potential investments in the zone next week, SCZone head Walid Gamal El Din said, according to a statement. The campaign will be launched domestically next Sunday, 23 October, before the international campaign kicks off on Monday, 24 October.

The Madbouly government’s economic conference takes place Sunday-Tuesday next week. We’re hoping for more details in the coming days.

Egypt and the UAE will host a two-day conference marking 50 years of bilateral ties. The gathering will take place next Wednesday-Friday, 26-28 October and is being produced in association with the two governments.

Fuel prices to rise this month? We’re expecting the government to hike fuel prices for the seventh consecutive quarter when the fuel pricing committee meets this month. Fuel prices have risen by as much as 28% over the past 18 months in response to heightened international oil prices, which surged earlier this year on the back of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Part of our monorail will be launched during COP27, the cabinet said in a statement. Once completed, the project will span 22 stations over 56.5 km with 40 trains transporting people across Cairo. The Madbouly government plans to inaugurate the eastern segment of the monorail from the New Administrative Capital to Nasr City in time for COP27. The USD 4.5 bn project is designed, built, supplied and operated by a consortium of Alstom, Orascom Construction and Arab Contractors.

☀️ TOMORROW’S WEATHER- We’re in for another pleasantly sunny day here in the capital city. Our favorite weather app tells us to expect a daytime high of 29°C before the mercury drops to 19°C in the evening.

EDITOR’S NOTE: This story was amended  on 18 October, 2022, to reflect that price caps on unsubsidized bread are only applicable to private bakeries that purchase flour from state grain buyer GASC. 

Always reaching for the junk and sweets when you’re stressed? You can train your brain to crave healthy food during peak stress periods, according to research from the University of Chicago and the University of California picked up by the Washington Post. Even though consuming junk food and higher amounts of calories alleviates stress and triggers dopamine, the pleasure hormone, scientists have found that you can trick your brain into seeking the same type of comfort from fruit and other healthier options.

Bye bag of chips, hello celery for stress relief: Participants of the study were trained to perform progressive muscle relaxation, a short daily stress reduction exercise which involves tensing and relaxing muscles from toes to head, and they were instructed to eat fresh fruit about five minutes into the relaxation sessions. By pairing the fruit with a relaxation exercise, the participants’ brains made an association and started seeing the fruit as something that reduced their stress levels which essentially turned it into a comfort food. After one week of carrying out the exercise and fruit eating, researchers found that consuming the fruit made the participants feel less stressed and in a better mood.

Successful implantation of human brain tissue into newborn rats could pave the way to treating psychiatric diseases, according to research from Stanford University. The research team implanted the human brain organoids (referred to sometimes as “mini-brains”) in newborn rats with no immune system to bypass tissue rejection in a bid to better understand psychiatric diseases at the biological level, the Financial Times reports

The organoids implanted into the rats were created from individuals with Timothy syndrome, a rare genetic disorder linked to autism and epilepsy. Researchers found that when a Timothy organoid was implanted into one hemisphere of a rat brain and a healthy person's organoid into the other, the Timothy organoid developed much smaller neurons with far fewer connections to synthroidnews.net. The experiments were the most successful efforts to date to get human neurons to function within the brains of animals, following more than 20 years of research around the world.

???? ON THE TUBE TONIGHT-
(all times CLT)

Six decades of iconic James Bond music: Amazon Prime’s Sound of 007, is a 90-minute documentary that charts the 60 year history the James Bond series — from Sean Connery’s Dr No to Daniel Craig’s No Time to die — which has given us some of the most iconic soundtracks and arguably the most recognizable movie theme song. The documentary kicks off by delving into the creation of the Bond theme by Monty Norman and its arrangement by John Barry, who went on to compose eleven Bond films’ scores. Directed by Mat Whitecross, the documentary goes on to show the creative process behind the 25 movies’ themes, which were performed by megastars including Paul McCartney, Billie Eilish, Tom Jones, and Madonna, using film and recording studio footage and new and archival interviews with actors, composers and others involved in the process.

⚽ Just a few matches tonight, folks: Villarreal faces Osasuna in the Spanish League in La Liga at 9pm. In Serie A, Sampdoria plays Roma at 6:30pm, then Lecce face Fiorentina at 8:45pm.

???? OUT AND ABOUT-
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Test out how easily you’re spooked at a screening of Nicole Kidman’s 2001 horror movie The Others tonight at Room Art Space Garden City at 9pm.

Comedy Therapy hits the Tap West’s stage tonight at 9pm, with this lineup of comedians: Kerolos Azer, Tawfeek Elhadedy, Ahmed Maged and Youssef Badawy.

Calling on Coldplay fans: Tribute band Strawberry Swing is performing the British rock band’s hits tonight at 9pm in Room Art Space New Cairo.

???? UNDER THE LAMPLIGHT-

Quarantine through the years: Until Proven Safe is the intriguing history of quarantines to stem the spread of illnesses, from the Black Death to covid-19. Journalists Geoff Manaugh and Nicola Twilley look at how humans have approached isolation through the years, from lazarettos for maritime travelers to the futuristic quarantine centers being drawn up today, and why the phenomenon, which although we’ve all been recently well acquainted with, remains (understandably) widely feared. The book explores some of the tools created and utilized throughout history, some of which hit very close to home, such as medieval beaked masks and early forms of contact teaching and health passports. It also explores the rationale behind quarantine: “There might be something dangerous inside you — something contagious — on the verge of breaking [away].”

The EGX30 rose 1.0% at today’s close on turnover of EGP 1.33 bn (26.4% above the 90-day average). Local investors were net buyers. The index is down 15.1% YTD.

In the green: Telecom Egypt (+6.1%), e-Finance (+5.5%) and GB Auto (+4.6%).

In the red: CIB (-1.0%), CIRA (-0.8%) and Oriental Weavers (-0.7%).

Online grocery delivery apps and social media are changing the ways people approach cooking and shopping for food. With the introduction of nationwide lockdowns, covid-19 spurred a boom in the online grocery delivery trend, but also shifted where people look for recipes, pushing more novice cooks to turn to social media platforms for ideas on what to cook and eat. “Social media has become the dominant channel for inspiring cooking — and, hence, for inspiring grocery shopping,” Anuraag Nallapti, COO of recipe and grocery shopping platform Jupiter writes for a Forbes Technology Council piece.

Gen-Zers turn to TikTok to make dining decisions: More than half (53%) of Gen Z respondents in Cassandra’s Young & Hungry macrotrend report find their inspiration for new foods on TikTok, Progressive Grocer reports. The report spoke to a sample of more than 1,500 consumers in the US and the UK aged 14 to 34 on how they go about deciding what to eat and drink. TikTok food trends, which often carry over to other social media platforms as well, can lead to quantifiable sales increases for certain products — as was demonstrated when a viral pasta recipe caused feta sales to shoot up 117%, Forbes reports. In 2021, 44% of Americans attempted to replicate a social media food trend, according to an Instacart survey of more than 2k adults in the US, conducted online by The Harris Poll. Additionally, 36% of Americans said social media has altered the way they go about cooking at home.

Pandemic lockdowns accelerated the online grocery delivery trend: Delivery orders increased by about 50% during the pandemic and are expected to continue their upward trend in 2022, according to a McKinsey report on e-commerce trends in North American grocery. Pandemic lockdowns gave the industry a clear glimpse of what happens when foot traffic at stores drops to a tiny fraction of its usual figure and also gave customers time to get accustomed to having their groceries delivered. The online delivery space in Egypt has also burgeoned in the last few years with different types of players in the space.

Egypt’s online grocery delivery space has also been booming — both from startups and from established chains: Large grocery stores and chains, such as Carrefour and Gourmet, have built digital storefronts or invested in optimizing their existing ones. (Gourmet CEO Jalal Abu Ghazaleh spoke to us in the first episode of our podcast, Making It, about the grocery store’s transformation into an e-commerce pioneer). Gourmet also publishes on its app and in a magazine some recipes using in-store products. These bigger stores and chains had to innovate to better be able to compete with the myriad of online delivery apps that exist in Egypt, including ultra-fast grocery delivery startup Rabbit, Breadfast — which raised USD 26 mn in series A round last year — and Talabat Mart. Other types of delivery apps have emerged on the scene as well: UAE-based Instashop also operates in Egypt and unlike most other delivery apps does not operate fulfillment centers (dark stores) but rather connects users to their local neighborhood stores.

How is the industry affected? These two trends have resulted in critical advertising money from FMCG players being redirected away from physical stores towards social media and online delivery platforms, Nallapti writes. Many physical stores do not have the necessary capital needed to build competitive digital storefronts which has put pressure on their bottom lines, while larger stores that do have developed online websites or apps. FMCGs that typically relied on customers purchasing their products in stores and spent large sums of advertising money for optimal product placement and ads in physical stores have shifted gears. Instacart's ad revenue is expected to be USD 795 mn in 2022. With footfall in stores dropping and the source of inspiration for buying food shifting to social media, FMCGs are shifting their advertising USDs to social media and online delivery platforms that offer several ad options.

FMCGs in Egypt have taken note of the trends: “We’re placing a greater focus on the online delivery space, which is growing rapidly,” Juhayna Marketing Director Amr Bishara told Enterprise. “We’ve majorly upped our advertising spending on e-commerce platforms to grow our market share in online retail channels. We’ve witnessed an increase in the number of people within our target segments utilizing online delivery apps over the past couple of years, especially the younger cohort,” he explained.

Looking forward: Nallapati believes that many grocery stores will be unable to build online stores and will die out, resulting in fewer traditional grocery shops existing in the future. He also anticipates that a greater percentage of grocery orders will be delivered instead, Nallapti says.