In his keynote address in the Opening Plenary Session of the U.S. National Committee on Irrigation and Drainage (USCID) 4 th International Conference (along with 58 th IEC of ICID), Dr Mahmoud Abu-Zeid, Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation, Cairo, Egypt, touched upon the challenges faced by Egypt in the water sector.
Egypt is an arid country with rapid population growth aspiring for an increasing standard of living. The Nile is the main source of water for the country. The Nile morphology and the barren desert that bounds the Nile Valley and Delta constitute a geographical barrier that prevents Egyptians from fully utilizing their land. Most available groundwater in the desert is non-renewable and associated with high development costs.
The Egyptian water resources system is composed of many interacting components. It intermingles with social, economic, and environmental systems, which are complex and uncertain. Fresh water resources include precipitation, Nile River flow and groundwater from both renewable and non-renewable aquifers.
Groundwater is an important source of fresh water in Egypt, both within the Nile system and in the desert. Nile aquifer is recharged by percolation and seepage losses from the irrigated lands and irrigation canals of the Basin. Groundwater exists in the non-renewable deep aquifers in the Western Desert and also in Sinai.
In the near future, the water supplies available from both conventional and non-conventional resources are expected to fall short of satisfying the increasing demands for water in Egypt. Concern is now turning to water quality issues also. A major recent shift in its policy of water resources is the new focus on water demand management.
Egypt has launched several projects to contribute to the demand management paradigm as well as to water quality conservation measures. The new policies aim to better utilize limited water resources and increase the efficiency of water use in all sectors. There are also several programs for cost recovery, institutional reforms, laws and legislation, and stakeholders' participation. The implementation of these policies so far is one of the MWRI's major achievements in meeting the challenges of the water sector; more actions will follow.
Besides, in order to relieve the population pressure in the Nile Delta and Nile Valley, Egypt has now embarked on an ambitious program to increase the inhabited area in Egypt (from 5.5 percent of the population living outside the Nile Valley and Delta to about 25 percent).
Agriculture is a major economic activity in Egypt. Although the agricultural sector represents only 17 percent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) (down from 40 percent in 1960), it is still a source of employment for about 40 percent of the labour force and has an important role in sustenance farming for many people. Agriculture remains the major water consumer and irrigation water accounts for about 95 percent of the total net demand. The increase in efficiency as aimed at will have important social as well as economic impacts, e.g. changes in the cropping pattern (shift from crops with a high water demand to less sensitive crops) etc.
Egypt exemplifies in the use of some marginal quality water like agricultural drainage water and treated domestic wastewater besides desalinated sea water. Reuse of agricultural drainage water has been practised in Egypt for many years; most drains in the Nile Valley flow back into the river's main stream. In the Nile Delta, an official policy for reuse of agricultural drainage water has been in vogue since the late 1970s. This policy calls for the recycling of agriculture drainage water by pumping it from main and branch drains and mixing it with fresh water in main and branch canals. Egypt has initiated programs for the treatment of domestic wastewater for potential reuse, besides the use of saline water. Desalination is intended to provide domestic water supplies for some locations along the Mediterranean and the Red Sea coasts as well as in the Sinai Peninsula.