Korean SepraTek to help Egypt produce desalination membranes

CAIRO - 18 June 2019: The Arab Organization for Industrialization signed a memorandum of understanding with South Korea-based SepraTek membrane manufacturing company to help enhance Egypt's national production in the field of water desalination.

Abdel Moneim al-Tarras, head of the AOI, explained that the areas of cooperation with SepraTekinclude transferring technical expertise, localizing technology, and training cadres for the purpose of designing, developing and manufacturing membrane production lines and producing pressure vessels in desalination plants by reverse osmosis system.

Tarras noted that the South Korean company will train engineers and technicians on manufacturing, assembling, and testing of products in accordance with quality requirements.

He highlighted that the AOI aims at providing the needs of the Egyptian market, and exporting the surplus to the Arab and African markets. The AOI largely contributes to produce local products and works to increase local production in the coming years, he added.

During a meeting between Tarras and a South Korean delegation, the two sides discussed establishing a factory for manufacturing membranes for water desalination by January 2020.

Desalination is defined as removing salt and minerals from salt water to be suitable for drinking or irrigation at least. After President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi inaugurated Al-Yusr desalination plant in Red Sea's Hurghada, Egypt's production of desalination water increased to 250,000 cubic meters per day, according to state's Al-Ahram.

This came as Egypt will likely face great water shortages after the building of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) in the Nile basin is completed, which will limit the amount of Nile water reaching Egypt. Egypt's annual share of Nile water is 55.5 billion cubic meters.