Farmers in North Sinai Governorate are leaving their professions and selling their land at cheap prices because of a security and water crisis that has threatened their livelihoods.

Farmer Ammar Ragab, 40, has a five-acre plot of land in the Rafah District, north of Arish, in North Sinai. Drought hit half of his crops of wheat and clover, and he was forced to sell the other half for less than it was worth.

Farmers in North Sinai Governorate are leaving their professions and selling their land at cheap prices because of a security and water crisis that has threatened their livelihoods.

Farmer Ammar Ragab, 40, has a five-acre plot of land in the Rafah District, north of Arish, in North Sinai. Drought hit half of his crops of wheat and clover, and he was forced to sell the other half for less than it was worth.

He says in recent months he and other farmers have been greatly affected by the security problem in North Sinai due to ongoing attacks by extremist groups. “The war has created many crises, including our inability to sell our crops because traders are reluctant to buy crops from North Sinai, which is bedeviled by several problems, mainly security’s inspection of goods leaving Arish,” says Ragab.

Ragab says his land used to produce high yields of wheat and clover, and that he could use the income produced by the crops to support his wife and three children. When the security situation worsened, however, he lost half the crop because water was only supplied once every four days. “I used to collect water inside tanks, but it, of course, was not enough to irrigate the land, causing half the crop to dry and be lost.”

No roads, no electricity

A major problem farmers are facing, says Ragab, is a failure to regulate the supply of electricity for installing pumps in wells to make irrigation possible. This problem has turned agricultural land into wastelands and made farmers reluctant to give priority to agriculture. They now sell their land at low prices and buy animal farms in order to compensate for their losses.

The continued presence of security ambushes set up to trap violent extremists who flee via farm roads is another major obstacle to farmers, not to mention that the roads are nearly impassable, as they are unpaved, poorly lit and sandy.

A lack of chemical fertilizers and seeds at the North Sinai Directorate of Agriculture (DoA) is another challenge to farmers in the area. “This forces us to buy them at high prices on the black market,” says Ragab.

Head of the Agricultural Trade Union in North Sinai Abdulhadi Hijazi says Sinai suffers from a real agricultural crisis and it has lost half its cultivated land due to essential problems for which officials could not find a solution. They place the blame on the deteriorating security situation to dodge complaints, he says.

Hijazi says well water is pumped using electric motors, and instead of regulating farmers’ needs, the Electricity Company (EC) officials fine them for stealing electricity. The fine, says Hijazi, may run as high as L.E. 10,000 (US $1,245), which forces farmers to sell their land and look for alternative occupations.

Caught in the middle

“We are all victims of terrorist actions perpetrated by Takfiri and Jihadist groups that kill the army, the police and Bedouins,” says Sweilem Abdulqader, the owner of a farm in Sheikh Zuweid. “Agriculture,” he says, “suffers because of the ongoing war between terrorists and the government, and we civilian residents are caught in the middle.”

He argues that because of these circumstances agriculture has been largely affected in this area owing to a lack of water for irrigation, electricity to run motors and safe roads to transport goods. This has caused some farmers to abandon agriculture.

Finding solutions

Undersecretary of the Ministry of Agriculture in North Sinai Engineer Atef Matar denies that there are problems regarding access to irrigation water in the governorate. Land, says Matar, is irrigated through wells abundant across the city.

Matar claims that the problem lies with the EC, which is responsible for operating motors to allow for unhindered irrigation of crops. Discussions are underway with the governorate, the Ministry of Electricity and farmers to find a way out of the problem.

The DoA, says Matar, receives farmers’ complaints and provides needed seeds to all farmers. Twenty thousand acres in North Sinai, says Matar, are irrigated by motor-operated wells without any problems.

Ragab stopped farming temporarily until the situation in North Sinai has settled. He has since switched to livestock trade and breeding.