Minister of Trade and Industry Tareq Qabil has said his ministry started measures to restructure trade representation offices abroad.

In a statement issued by the ministry Sunday, Qabil said the plan includes freezing the activities of trade offices in Nicosia, Kiev, Chicago, Sydney, Copenhagen, Lisbon, Tripoli, Sanaa, Damascus and Basra.

He pointed out that the number of staffers will be reduced in the trade offices in Rome, Berlin, New York, Prague, Athens, Bucharest, Jakarta, Dakar, Khartoum and Erbil with opening five new offices in Accra, Dar Es Salam, Kampala, Abidjan, Djibouti and Muscat.

According to Qabil, opening new offices in some African countries would help increase economic relations between Egypt and African states especially in the countries which are members of the Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa (COMESA), the East Africa Community (EAC) and the Southern African Development Community