Kharga declared Egypt's 1st environment-friendly city

CAIRO – 6 June 2022: Minister of Environment Yasmin Fouad declared New Valley's Kharga Egypt's first environment-friendly city. That was during her visit to the governorate on World Environment Day marking June 5.

Kharga was chosen to be environment-friendly because it has no factories, except for those of date packaging, and because it depends on solar power and natural gas for energy. Further, the share per capita in green areas is 500 square meters.  

The minister laid the foundation stone of a solar park worth LE16.25 million, and whose capacity is 1.5 megawatts. The utility has a surface area of 22,000 square meters.     

Over the past three years, the ministry, in cooperation with the New Valley municipal authority, planted 7,000 trees on Al Kharga Airport road extending on 11 kilometers. That is in addition to introducing a plantation spanning over five feddans (one feddan equals 4,500 square meters) to produce 30,000 seedlings that will be installed across the governorate.

The ministry also provided the governorate with 5,000 olive trees, and will deliver another 5,000 soon. Further, the minister and the governor attended the event of planting 1,000 trees along the fences of the New Valley University.

The governorate's municipal authority had introduced a bike lane stretching on 6.3 kilometers at a cost of LE10 million, and has been working on the automation and digitalization of services.

The minister visited an under-progress agricultural project that is meant to be the largest in the governorate. The project located at Al Tahan Oasis lies on 180 feddans, and is planned to consist of 100 greenhouses that will produce vegetables and fruits. Fifty of those have been put in place until present.

Moreover, a palm tree farm is being set up on 90 feddans to encompass 18,000 seedlings by the end of 2022. Seven thousand palm trees have already been planted. The farm will have 18 fridges to preserve dates, as the capacity of each is 2,500 tons.  

Fisheries will be established on 1.5 feddans in order to produce 50 tons of tilapia and mullet fish per season. That is in addition to introducing five lakes with a capacity of 125 tons. The other projects that are underway include an animal production farm, horse riding school, and silk production laboratories.

A factory has been launched to recycle agriculture waste, turning it into fertilizers and cattle feed. What's more, an initiative has been launched to cultivate the rooftops of public buildings, like schools, with herbs among others.