Farmers harvest wheat on Qalyub farm in the El-Kalubia governorate, northeast of Cairo, Egypt May 1, 2016. – (Reuters)
CAIRO - 19 April 2022: The State is keen on boosting local wheat cultivation in a bid to attain self-sufficiency, said Agriculture Ministry Spokesman Mohamed el Qersh.
All the agriculture sectors witnessed major development over the past period, including the wheat crop, he told Extra News Channel on Tuesday.
As for the price of local wheat, the spokesman said that the price of supplying ardeb was set at EGP 725 pounds last year, with an increase of EGP 65, reaching up to EGP 885.
Thanks to the government's efforts to encourage farmers to expand their agricultural land, the cultivated area of wheat has exceeded 3.6 million acres, added the spokesman.
Egyptian Prime Minister Mustafa Mabdouli announced on April 4 that Egypt’s wheat stock for domestic consumption is sufficient for 2.6 months, adding that the government has allocated EGP 1.1 billion to the Supply Commodities Authority and the Agricultural Bank of Egypt for purchasing the local wheat from the local farmers.
During the meeting, Minister of Supply and Internal Trade Ali Meselhi confirmed that the supply of local wheat goes smoothly, noting that there are more than 450 locations to supply wheat nationwide.
Egypt’s wheat imports are projected to go down due to the Ukraine-Russian, said the US Foreign Agriculture Service (FAS) of the US Department of Agriculture on March 28, 2022.
“FAS Cairo forecasts Egypt’s wheat imports in MY 2022/23 (July – June) at 11 MMT, down by 8.3 percent from MY 2021/22 Post’s import estimate figure of 12 MMT. Importing and buying wheat from other markets remains a viable option for government and private purchases,” the FAS said in its report.
Egypt is currently suffering from a crisis of wheat supply from the conflicting Russia and Ukraine, the two biggest wheat importers to Egypt. So, the government is targeting to increase the area of the wheat crops by 1.5 million feddans over the next three years in accordance with a new study conducted by the Egyptian Cabinet's Information and Decision Support Center (IDSC).
Despite the government’s efforts to secure the wheat supply that is essential for the subsidized bread, one of the 2011 Revolution’s slogans, the government would not stop importing wheat from other countries like France even with high prices to fill the gap between the local production and the consumption, as it was stated to Egypt Today by the head of the Farmers’ Syndicate Hussein Abdel Rahman Abu Saddam.
Three days ago, the Egyptian government announced India as a new wheat supplier. Qusseir announced in a statement on Thursday that India has been recognized as a new country of origin for importing wheat within the framework of the state’s plan to open new sources of importing wheat as a strategic commodity.
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