Industrial Policy & Trade Monitor· 2667 actions· ✨ 89 recent

Prime Minister Dr Mostafa Madbouly issued Decree No. 503 of 2026 on 25 February 2026, expanding the catalogue of industrial activities eligible for investment incentives under Egypt's Investment Law No. 72/2017 and linking them to Sector A / Sector B geographic classifications. Sector A projects (underserved areas, Upper Egypt, the New Administrative Capital, and economic zones) receive a 50% deduction of investment costs from net taxable profits over seven years, capped at 80% of paid-in capital; Sector B projects (remaining regions) receive a 30% deduction on the same terms. Newly designated priority activities include all automobile and vehicle categories (conventional and electric), electric motors and engines, refrigerator evaporators and compressors, sheet metal for electrical/electronic appliances, pipes and tubes, fruit/vegetable concentrates, and concentrated sulfuric acid. The decree consolidates and supersedes prior incentive decisions issued since 2022, deepening import-substitution and local-content pressure across automotive, electronics, and chemicals supply chains feeding Suez Canal Economic Zone investors and feeder-industry suppliers.

Thailand's Board of Investment issued Notification No. Sor. 5/2568 (5/2025), dated 5 June 2025, amending the Schedule of Investment-Promoted Activities under BOI Notification No. 9/2565 across roughly 32 activity categories, including machinery and automotive, electrical appliances and electronics, metals and materials, public utilities, digital, and creative industries. The revision extends standard BOI tax and import-duty investment-promotion incentives to accumulator/battery-cell manufacturing activities within these categories, while discontinuing promoted status for metal-cutting activities (Category 5.4.10). The notification applies to investment- promotion applications submitted on or after 1 July 2025, and was later published in the Royal Gazette on 22 January 2026.

On 13 March 2024 the State Council issued the Action Plan on Promoting Large-Scale Equipment Renewal and Consumer Goods Trade-In as Guo Fa [2024] No. 7, distributed by NDRC alongside ten implementing ministries. Branded the "Two New" (两新) initiative, it is the flagship Xi/Li-era domestic-demand industrial-policy instrument structured around four action lines (equipment renewal, consumer-goods trade-in, recycling and circular utilisation, standards uplift) with twenty specific tasks and 2027 quantitative targets including ≥25% increase in equipment investment vs 2023 across industry, agriculture, construction, transport, education and healthcare. Funded by CNY 150bn of ultra-long-term special treasury bonds in 2024, expanded to CNY 300bn earmarked in 2025, the programme drove >CNY 1.3 trillion of consumer-goods trade-in transactions (autos, appliances, home furnishings, e-bikes) in its first year and is the central pillar of Beijing's response to the property-sector slowdown.