South Sinai--Amin Abaza, minister of agriculture and land reclamation, has announced that 45,000 feddans will be allotted for the first industrial agriculture project in the regions of Rabaa, Be'r el-Abd and North of Qantara in the Sinai peninsula. During his tour in southern Sinai, Abaza said that strict regulations have been put in place to save water for irrigation in order to increase cultivated areas and develop the farm irrigation systems. These new regulations will prevent the older, water-costly irrigation methods from being used in these reclaimed areas of the Sinai. "Our limited water resources require us to maintain every single drop and not to waste it," said Abaza, adding that the priorities of Egypt's policy during the upcoming years are to carry out a project for developing irrigation on old lands, in addition to using treated agricultural drainage water for projects of horizontal expansion outside the fertile valley. Abaza also spoke of a five-year project to replace Sinai's palms and other native trees with more productive varieties. This particular replanting project will be carried out in collaboration with the Union of Producers and Exporters of Horticultural Crops (UPEHC). For his part, Adel el-Beltagi, head of the Research and Development Council, stated that the Egypt's agricultural strategy until 2030 is to prepare for any negative effects on agriculture resulting from climate change. With the aid of preemptive scientific studies, crops that resist drought, high temperatures, and salinity can be developed, he concluded. Translated from the Arabic Edition.
