The World Bank has granted a $200-million loan to Egypt to accelerate recovery in the country’s struggling small- to medium-enterprise sector.

The loan will provide seed funding to existing businesses and start-ups through the country’s Social Development Fund.

It marks the first loan granted by the World Bank to Egypt since the election of Mohamed Mursi in June.

It also comes in the same week Qatar agreed to loan the country $2bn in a bid to breathe life into its ailing economy.

The agreement between Mursi’s cabinet and the World Bank has been finalised despite protests from some Egyptian Islamist parliamentarians that international loan arrangements are against Islamic law.