Egypt's Irrigation Ministry overviews hundreds of joint water projects accomplished in fellow African states

CAIRO – 28 December 2020: Minister of Irrigation and Water Resources Mohamed Abdel Aty held Sunday a meeting with the ministry's senior officials to overview the joint projects executed in African states over the past years.

With regard to rainwater harvesting dams, Egyptian companies build seven of those in Uganda. As for digging wells and establishing underground water treatment plants, the breakdown is 180 in Kenya, 75 in Uganda, 30 in Tanzanya, 10 in Sudan's Darfur, and six in South Sudan. In addition, a water elevation unit was set up in South Sudan in order to deliver the rivers' water to nearby residential areas.

The ministry contributed by conducting feasibility studies for some of those projects, and reviewing the design of certain dams. Furthermore, it cleaned a number of canals, introduced fisheries, reduced the size of swamps, and installed units for transforming waterweeds into biogas and fertilizers.

Egypt and Uganda are currently undertaking the fifth phase of combating waterweeds in the Great Lakes. In the same country, the second phase of a flood prevention project is underway in Kasese town while three fisheries, and two river harbors have been accomplished. In South Sudan, similar quays were built.  

Every year, 100 non-Egyptian Africans are granted training courses in the irrigation and water management sector. That is in addition to those awarded scholarships to master's and PhD programs in Egypt. The countries mostly benefiting from such opportunities are Sudan, South Sudan, Ethiopia, Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, Democratic Congo, Eretria, Ghana, Zambia, Malawi, Cameron, and Burkina Fasu.