Three decades after the late President Anwar Sadat announced the infitah, or economic opening, of Egypt, has the Gift of the Nile finally fulfilled predictions in becoming an economic Tiger on the Nile? A recent article in the Wall Street Journal (subscription required) reported that Egypt’s stock market has risen 32% this year, the fastest rate among significant emerging markets, and this after gains of 81% and 119% over the past two years. Some of the credit must go to Prime Minister Ahmad Nazif, whose team has cut corporate taxes, income taxes (by half) and custom tariffs (by almost half).

Egypt certainly has a long way to go. With a per capita income of only about $1,400 , the country’s total market capitalization is only a little over 10% that of Brazil, the Journal noted. And there are all those social and political problems to be managed as well. Yet having spent much of the 1990’s on an extended fiscal diet which significantly improved its debt-to-GDP ratio, Egypt may now be set for more consistent growth.

Contributed by Kirk H. Sowell at Window on the Arab World, and More!