The government's decision to reduce the rice-cultivated areas caused bitter anger among farmers nationwide. In Beheira, farmers called for increasing rice-cultivated areas after the government reduced them to 175,000 acres only. They said this space does not suit Egypt's first agricultural province, especially after farmers decided not to cultivate cotton due to its low prices. Saeed Zaki, a farmer, said: "Rice has become the main crop now because we are not going to grow cotton. Therefore, the government should help us grow rice and cancel the fines it imposed against us last year. We will be imprisoned if we did not pay the bank loans we got to meet the high price of production."
Mohammed Khairy, the Ministry of Agriculture Undersecretary in Beheira, said the area allocated for rice has not declined for many years, but the government did not punish who did not abide by its decisions or exempt farmers from last year's fines, LE2200 per acre.
In Gharbia, farmers rejected the government decision to reduce the rice-cultivated area to 70,000 acres from 180,000 acres per year. This pushed a number of lawmakers to file urgent interpellations to the Prime Minister and the ministers of irrigation and agriculture in this regard.
Ahmed Al-Ga'oudi, the Ministry of Agriculture Undersecretary in Gharbia, said the province's arable areas are 380,000 acres, including 30,000 cultivated with fruits. Therefore, the ministry decided to reduce the rice-cultivated area from 180,000 acres to 70,000 acres. 110,000 acres were cultivated with rice every year in defiance to the government's decisions. The government's recent decision aims to reduce the rice-cultivated areas that have become too large to have negative effects on the world price of rice, he added.
Ismailia farmers refused any decisions to ban the cultivation of rice or confining it to certain areas. They called for specialized technical committees to inspect their plots of land, which could be cultivated with rice only due to their special nature and high percentage of groundwater.
Abdel Aziz Ismail, a farmer, said: "Most of our lands in the villages of Al-Saba' Abar and Al-Manaif could be only cultivated with rice. Before taking such decisions that do harm to farmers, the government had to study the special nature of land. Although the government increased penalties to imprisonment this year, we do not have a solution but to cultivate rice." He called on Governor Abdel Galil al-Fakharani to intervene and alleviate the suffering of the farmers. Yasser Dahshan, member of Ismailia local council, stressed the importance of forming a committee to list the plots of land that are suitable for the cultivation of rice only. After that, this list has to be submitted to the irrigation and agriculture directorates to exclude them from the ban.
Saeed Abdel Azim, the Ministry of Irrigation Undersecretary in Ismailia, said the decision to reduce the rice-cultivated areas or exempt farmers from any fines or sentences is a sovereign decision that could be only taken by the Prime Minister or the Minister of Irrigation in accordance with the law.
