Egypt Imports 62% of Food Commodities due to Water Shortage

Despite Egypt's reuse of water from treated agriculture and wastewater, there is a water gap of 22 billion cubic meters annually, which makes Egypt import 62% of its food supplies due to the lack of water for agriculture, said Nader Nour el-Din, Professor of Water Resources, Faculty of Agriculture, Cairo University.

This came during the symposium held by the Egyptian Center for Economic Studies to discuss the dilemma of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD).

Nour el-Din stressed that Egypt needs 104 billion cubic meters of water to reach the water poverty line of 1,000 cubic meters annually per capita, while the size of the water gap is estimated at 42 billion cubic meters, and Egypt is trying to re-use 20 billion of treated wastewater.

The professor of water resources added that the electricity to be generated from the Renaissance Dam will be offered for sale to South Sudan, and therefore the Egyptian share of water should not be lay hold off but, rather the main points of concern should be the volume of water stored and the number of years required to fill the dam as well as the amount of water that Egypt will obtain after the operation of the dam.

On his part, Ibrahim Nawar, economist and former adviser to the Ministry of trade called for the necessity of entering into development programs between the Nile Basin countries in the Nile resources from a regional and multi-level approach.

"In order to avoid a conflict between the Nile basin countries, an international conference should be held to bring together all upstream and downstream countries, the European Union (EU) and the African Union (AU) as well as the UN Security Council to implement an integrated development system in the region.

Mohamed Sameh Amr, professor of public international law and permanent delegate of Egypt to UNESCO doubts the Ethiopian intentions unless an agreement is reached, pointing out that Egypt wanted an official recognition of its Historical rights in the Nile waters, bearing in mind that there rights are recognized by international law and have solid standards.

Egypt is the world's biggest importer of wheat due to water scarcity. Egypt also imports 80-90% of its essential supplies of beans, not to mention the ban on the cultivation of rice and other basic commodities, as well the shortfall of the white gold "Cotton" industry.

Egypt has a great potential to be a leading agricultural hub, having been able to be one of the largest exporters of oranges, frozen strawberries and dates in the world, not to mention the Egyptian citrus and grapes that are globally recognized.

The scarcity of water is hindering Egypt from expanding its urban area, causes drought to agricultural land in Egypt, putting many farmers to unemployment and forcing them to sell their land, not to mention the health problems cause by the drinking sewage or wastewater.