Assiut Launches an Online Market for the Trade of Livestock

The Assiut village of Arab Mutair has launched an online marketplace for trading livestock to limit in-person interactions in the midst of the Coronavirus crisis. After traditional markets were closed by the state as a preventative measure, this out-of-the-box move is a historic step for Egypt’s farmers and agroindustry workers.

Member of the House of Representatives, Mohamed Hany Al-Hinnawy, called on all those involved in the livestock market to implement similar initiatives at the national level. The online market, which operates on Facebook’s marketplace, is meant to be a compromise between protecting lives and maintaining the livelihood of those in the city especially considering that many of them have a week-to-week income.