Deputy governor of the Central Bank of Egypt Gamal Negm said the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) play a key role in boosting the economy of any country.

In a conference on the small and medium enterprises on Wednesday, Negm said such enterprises would promote the inclusive financial concept, pointing out that such projects open the door of hope to achieve economic development and end unemployment.

He stressed the importance of the presence of Credit Guarantee Schemes for SME lending to increase the rates of the projects implementation in the most impoverished governorates.

For his part, Dr Abdel Rahman el Hamidy, the head of the Arab Monetary Fund, said the SMEs are very important for facing the unemployment problem in the Arab world which hit 28 percent last year.