Unveiling Egypt's Employment Trends

Updated 5/1/2025 9:00:00 AM

Labor Day, celebrated on May 1^st in many countries around the world, including Egypt, honors the contributions of workers and the labor movement.

One of Egypt’s key economic strengths is its youthful population, which plays a major role in attracting foreign investment, particularly given the competitiveness of labor costs.

In this Factsheet, we salute Egyptian workers and take a closer look at the key features of Egypt’s labor force.

The Egyptian labor force reached 32.041 million in 2024, representing a 2.9% year-on-year (YoY) increase due to a rise in the number of employed people.
The majority of the labor force is in the rural areas, with 17.96 million workers accounting for 56% of the total labor force. On the other hand, the labor force in urban areas reached 14.07 million people.
In 2024, Egypt ranked low in terms of female labor force participation rate in the Global Gender Gap Index, placing 145^th out of 146 countries with a score of 0.217. This can be clearly seen in the labor force, where females represent only 18.6%, while males dominate the remaining 81.4%.
The number of employed individuals increased by 3.3% YoY to 29.928 million in 2024, with 42.5% in urban areas and 57.5% in rural areas.
Around 72.7% of employed individuals reported working in paid jobs, while 19.6% are self-employed, 4.3% work in unpaid family businesses, and 3.9% are business owners.
The agriculture and fisheries sector dominated Egypt’s employment scene in 2024, making up 18.7% of the workforce. Wholesale and retail activities followed with 15.5% of total employment, and the building and construction sector came third with 13.5% . Meanwhile, the industrial sector employed 3.946 million people, representing 13.2%.
The number of unemployed individuals stood at 2.113 million, equivalent to a 6.6% unemployment rate, marking an annual fall of 0.4%.
Unemployment among males declined from 4.7% in 2023 to 4.2% in 2024. Similarly, unemployment among females fell from 17.8% to 17.1% during the same period.
In the fourth quarter (Q4) of 2024, the highest average weekly wages were recorded in the mining, electricity and gas supplies, and brokerage and insurance sectors. Conversely, the lowest wages were reported in the wholesale and retail sector. Notably, the Egyptian government raised the minimum wage for both public and private sector employees to EGP 7,000.