Non-decimal currency Non-decimal currency A non-decimal currency is a currency that has sub-units that are a non-decimal fraction of the main unit, i.e. the number of sub-units in a main unit is not a power of 10. Today only two countries in the world use non-decimal currencies. Both of these countries are in Africa. These are Mauritania (1 ouguiya = 5 khoums) and Madagascar (1 ariary = 5 iraimbilanja). However these are only theoretically non-decimal, as in both cases the value of the main unit is so low that the sub-unit is too small to be of any practical use and coins
British currency in the Middle East gold and silver. With this the Egyptian pound, known as the "geneih", was introduced, replacing the Egyptian piastre ("ersh") as the chief unit of currency. The piastre continued to circulate as of a pound, with the piastre subdivided into 40 para. In 1885, the para ceased to be issued, and the piastre was divided into tenths ( " 'oshr el-ersh"). These tenths were renamed milliemes ("malleem") in 1916. The Egyptian pound was also used in Anglo-Egyptian Sudan between 1899 and 1956, and Cyrenaica when it was under British occupation and later an independent emirate between 1942 and 1951. The National