Egypt plans to lease farmland for agro-business projects this year but is waiting for the Ministry of Agriculture to allocate suitable plots, the country's Minister of Trade Rashid Mohamed Rashid has said. The head of Egypt's Industrial Development Authority (IDA) had told Reuters last April lthat Egypt would start up its agro-industrial zones project in June 2009. "The project is totally ready but what we have been waiting for is the allocation of land. We need agricultural land," Rashid told reporters on Monday. The IDA had said Egypt could raise as much as LE66 billion ($12 billion) by 2020 through the scheme. The Agriculture Ministry has notified the trade ministry that some plots in the Sinai peninsula, southern Egypt and the Western Desert could be allocated for the project, Rashid said. "As soon as this land is available we will move," he said. The project envisages leasing plots of farmland with suitable irrigation facilities and ample space for a manufacturing site to Egyptian and foreign investors. The Ministry has compiled a list of potential projects ranging from sugar factories to tomato paste manufacturing. "The land will be long-lease, anywhere between 40 and 99 years," Rashid said. The Ministry prefers not to lease the land through auctions, to avoid raising land prices, but will look at offers presented by investors for various plots and then decide. "If we end up having more than one offer for the land we will decide whether it will be an auction or whether it will be based on the priority of the project," Rashid added. IDA also said it was tendering 42 million square meters of land to develop for industrial projects, the official Middle East News Agency (MENA) reported. The tender is open to private and state investors, both international and Egyptian, MENA quoted Rashid as saying. Of the land, eight million square metres are slated for development in Tenth of Ramadan City northeast of Cairo, 9 million in Sadat City northwest of Cairo and seven million in Borg el-Arab near Alexandria, MENA cited IDA Chairman Amr Assal as saying. The industrial projects are expected to attract total investments worth up to LE85 billion, MENA reported. It gave no timeframe for the tender. The Ministry requires industrial developers to adhere to maximum selling prices for the land and not to sell it through auction to prevent competing bidders from raising prices.
