CAIRO – Ras Ghareb, in northern Red Sea Governorate, is the main centre for Egypt's petroleum industry. Nearly 70 per cent of Egypt's crude oil is produced here. You might think this is great for the good people of Ras Ghareb, but they're still suffering economically and socially. They need more jobs and they would like their city to become a tourism hub, similar to Hurghada and other Red Sea cities. Mohamed Rafei, who lives in Ras Ghareb, told Al-Ahram semi-official newspaper that, though there are large quantities of natural gas in the area, the Government has yet to establish a facility to bottle it. “The gas gets transported by tanker to Mostorod and Qattamiya, where it is bottled in cylinders, which are then distributed to the markets. Transporting the gas to Mostorod and Qattamiya raises the cost,“ according to Rafei. Lotfi el-Damarani, who also lives in Ras Ghareb, said that the Government has yet to establish a petrochemical factory in the city, although it is an ideal place from which to export such products. “We could also do with a factory for manufacturing plastic mineral water bottles. In 2005, former minister of petroleum Sameh Fahmi announced that such a factory would open in Ras Ghareb, in collaboration with Bahrain, but as usual nothing has been done,” he commented. Nor is there a plant to manufacture derivatives such as fuel oil, petrol, diesel and others. There's no shortage of raw materials; all that's needed is the machinery. “And why don't we have a refinery?” asked Rafei. “Assiut, about 380km south of Cairo, has a refinery, although it's very expensive to transport the raw materials there.” The head of Ras Ghareb City Council, Saad Eddin Amin, agrees that their petroleum wealth should be better exploited. “We have plenty of space to build tens of factories. Besides, we have plenty of electricity, because of all the power produced by wind energy in Zaafaran,” he stressed. Zaafaran is the most important area in Egypt and the Middle East for producing wind energy and production should double in the near future. The Red Sea has good road links to the rest of Egypt, making it easy to transport petroleum products nationwide.
