Water Woes Multiply For Egypt - Per Capita Availability 60% Of Global Standard
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Egypt’s agriculture sector consumes well over 80 percent of the country’s annual water resources and sugarcane accounts for a large portion, alongside rice and cotton.
Rice production has been banned by the government in some areas for its heavy water requirements, though it commands a high price on the international market, is a staple for the population, and a certain quantity helps control soil salinity and limits saltwater intrusion in the Delta. Egypt is instead the world’s largest importer of wheat and buys over half of its requirements from abroad, much of which goes into subsidised bread for the quarter of its 84 million people who live below the poverty line of 1.65 dollars a day.
A serious issue is that outdated irrigation practices are still in use, Hussein Jeffrey John Gawad, a hydro-geologist working as a consultant in Egypt, told IPS. “Because there was always an abundance of water before, they just continue flooding the farms,” he said. “Many people need to start measuring how much water they use, but it’s hard to break traditions here.”
In certain areas of the country, it is instead an excess of water that is causing problems. The most traditional face of Egypt to the world – and its main magnet for tourism, a sector that accounted for more than a tenth of Egypt’s GDP prior to the 2011 uprising – may be in danger as well, Gawad noted, due to rising groundwater around the country’s ancient monuments.
As the population swells, agriculture increasingly encroaches on areas near important monuments, bringing with it artificial irrigation channels to which chemical fertilisers are added, thereby increasing salinity levels and seeping into limestone foundations, weakening them.
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http://www.ipsnews.net/2014/02/egypts-generals-face-watery-battle/