President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi witnessed today the inauguration of the New Delta project on the Sheikh Zayed axis in Giza Governorate (formerly the Dabaa axis).
Upon arrival, the President was received by Dr. Mostafa Madbouly, Prime Minister; Dr. Hussein Eissa, Deputy Prime Minister for Economic Affairs; Lieutenant General Ashraf Salem Zaher, Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and Minister of Defense and Military Production; Lieutenant General Ahmed Khalifa, Chief of Staff of the Armed Forces; Hassan Abdullah, Governor of the Central Bank; Lieutenant General Engineer Kamel El-Wazir, Minister of Transport; Dr. Hani Sweilem, Minister of Water Resources and Irrigation; Dr. Sherif Farouk, Minister of Supply and Internal Trade; Alaa Farouk, Minister of Agriculture and Land Reclamation; and Colonel Dr. Bahaa El-Ghannam, Executive Director of the Future of Egypt Authority for Sustainable Development.
The official spokesman for the Presidency of the Republic stated that the celebration began with the recitation of verses from the Holy Quran, followed by the screening of a documentary film entitled “The New Delta”, followed by a speech by Colonel Dr. Bahaa Al-Ghannam, Executive Director of the Future of Egypt Authority for Sustainable Development, during which the water pumping station No. (3) was inaugurated via video conference.
Ambassador Mohamed El Shenawy, the official spokesperson, added that the President indicated during his intervention that what happened in the New Delta project would not have happened except thanks to God Almighty and the efforts of the Egyptian people. He called on the Egyptian people to be happy and proud of what has been accomplished within the framework of this project, pointing to the great challenges that the project faced and were overcome in order to implement it. He noted that the project is witnessing a concerted effort from all state agencies, with the active participation of the private sector, as 150 companies are working in agricultural production alone, in addition to hundreds of companies in other activities.
Regarding the volume of work carried out within the framework of the project, the President indicated that the cost of the project reached approximately 800 billion pounds, at a cost of between 350 and 400 thousand pounds per acre, in addition to the construction of new roads with lengths of up to 12,000 km.
In the same context, the President pointed to the challenge related to providing the necessary water for the project, by collecting agricultural drainage water from the lands of the Delta governorates after treating it with tertiary treatment, then establishing and lining two routes, namely the northern route and the eastern route, each of which is 150 km long. His Excellency highlighted in this context that transporting the collected water was against the natural geographical slope of the lands, which required the establishment of 19 main pumping stations to provide water for the cultivation of 2.2 million acres. His Excellency also noted the establishment of power generation stations with a total capacity of about 2000 megawatts.
The President emphasized that the strategic vision for the project, as well as for developing the productivity of the agricultural sector in Egypt, is based on achieving integration between old and new agricultural lands. This involves producing traditional crops such as wheat and corn from the clay soils of the Nile Valley and Delta due to their high productivity, while focusing on crops that thrive in desert areas, such as sugar beets, in the new lands. This approach maximizes the utilization of land and crop rotation. The President also noted that the project will provide approximately two million job opportunities, stressing that these are sustainable, not temporary, jobs. He further highlighted the importance of the private sector's role in the project, explaining that the farming is being carried out by private companies with whom agreements are made regarding the targeted crops according to the established crop rotation system.
The President also stressed the difficulty of achieving self-sufficiency in all crops, whether in Egypt or in most countries of the world, because agricultural production depends on several climatic, water and environmental considerations, noting that Egypt imports between 14 and 17 million tons of animal feed annually, in addition to wheat imports.
In this context, the President stressed that achieving development is an ongoing and never-ending process, and that ambition also never ends, including in order to maximize agricultural production, as he noted the other projects being implemented in Minya, Beni Suef, Kom Ombo, Toshka, East Oweinat, and Sinai.
The official spokesman stated that the President then conducted an inspection tour, where he inspected Water Pumping Station No. (3) Nab3, and a model of industrial works “Operation and Control System”, reaching the point of harvesting wheat. In this regard, His Excellency listened to a detailed explanation about the productivity of the wheat acre and the quality of the crop, after which His Excellency participated in a commemorative photo with the workers of the project and some of the attendees.
The official spokesperson explained that the President concluded his inspection tour by observing the productivity of the sugar beet crop.
