Egypt’s Parliament discusses rice plantation issues

CAIRO – 6 May 2017: Egypt’s Parliament discussed rice plantation issues last Thursday. Parliamentarian, Khaled Mashhour, requested that the Minister of Agriculture and Irrigation submit their briefing on rice plantation issues.

Khaled Mashhour (MP) pointed out that the Minister of Agriculture and Irrigation’s decision, which stated that the planted area of rice has been limited to one million and 76,000 acres in eight governorates, will lead to an increase in rice plantation issues.

In addition to this the parliamentarian declared that there are two main reasons for the increase in rice plantation issues in Egypt. There are no censorship authorities on rice exporting and rice plantation needs a huge amount of water.

“Why did the minister of agriculture not pay attention up until now to the importance of the scientific research in the agriculture field? Why did the minister not replace the cultivation of water-intensive crops by the water-extensive crops? Why did the minister not give up the old methods of irrigation? Where is scientific research on irrigation for saving water?”, Khaled Mashhour wondered.

The parliamentarian asked the agriculture minister to provide some solutions to the rice plantation issues in Egypt.