Sector Background: The Chemical Industries is considered to be one of the largest industrial sectors; it includes 7 main sub-sectors, which are Plastics, Rubber, Paper, Detergents, paints, Miscellaneous Chemicals    and Fertilizers . SMEs represents about 56 % of the total registered companies, which benefit from the IMC'   services. A new Challenging trade barrier facing the Chemicals sector's exports occurred when the REACH      legislative came into force; this may lead to affecting the export to the EU which represents about   80% of the sector total export. IMC supported the pre-registration process which guarantee extensions for the registration  process. The total number of companies that benefited from the IMC in the pre-registration of  there products is amounted to 70 companies, and the total number of pre-registered substances is amounted to 1300 substances.

2008 Data:

• Value of exports grows from 15.6 billion EGP in year 2007 to 21.4 billion EGP for year 2008 with a growth rate of 42%
  
• The main markets for the sector were The European Union Countries
  
• Total companies registered at IMC are 896, with total employment of 75,000 employees
  
• Total investment of these companies is 35 billion EGP