“The land is thirsty,” says Mohamed Mansur, a farmer with a five-acre plot of land in Bilqas in Dakahlia Governorate. “The rice stalks are 10 cm high but they lack water.”
There are only four waterways irrigating 63,000 acres, says Mansur, which challenges the water pressure and the rice dries out due to heat and a lack of water.
“I have no choice but to wait for the winter beet season in order to pay the land’s rent and I have to forget all about the rice season,” Mansur says.
“The land is thirsty,” says Mohamed Mansur, a farmer with a five-acre plot of land in Bilqas in Dakahlia Governorate. “The rice stalks are 10 cm high but they lack water.”
There are only four waterways irrigating 63,000 acres, says Mansur, which challenges the water pressure and the rice dries out due to heat and a lack of water.
“I have no choice but to wait for the winter beet season in order to pay the land’s rent and I have to forget all about the rice season,” Mansur says.
For the last 15 years, farmers in more than 42 villages in Bilqas have seen their crops threatened with drought and their lands suffer from desertification at the beginning of each summer season.
“The crisis is repeated every year and threatens 38,000 acres in Bilqas and exposes farmers to imprisonment and loss,” said Rizk Faraj, head of the farmers union in Dakahlia Governorate. “Farmers get loans from the banks hoping to pay them back at the harvest of rice and cotton.”
“One acre of land produces four to five tons of rice. A ton of white rice is sold at L.E. 4,500 (US $507) when the government allows for its export,” says Faraj.
That means that Mansur would earn L.E. 112,000 (US $12,600) for his five acres, if he manages to market his entire crop. After deducting the cost of fertilizers and other needs, which amount to L.E. 10,000 (US $1,125) for each acre or L.E. 50,000 (US $5,628) for the five acres, he is left with L.E. 60,000 (US $6,750) for a season which lasts six months.
Illegal farming
Authorities blame the water shortage on illegal farming. Mohamed Salam, the Ministry of Irrigation’s Undersecretary said farmers exceeded the permitted limit of cultivated areas of 300,000 acres. The cultivated area, this year, is 600,000.
“We issued a decision to dry all the illegal, rice crop lands to deter people from illegal farming,” explains Salam. “We launched a campaign in which members of a committee composed of the Agricultural Administration in Dikirnis and Irrigation Engineering took part. We sprayed the illegally rice crops in Mit Elkorama and the Sittin Basin with Herbazed.”
Lifting station is needed
But farmer union head Faraj says the solution lies in the infrastructure that would allow water to be more evenly distributed. “We demand that the governor and the irrigation directorate build a lifting station from Bahr Abboud, a drainage system near Bilqas so that it flows into four waterways: Basar, Darfil, Tibn and Naqqa, which irrigate lands in the villages of Hafir and Shihabeddin in Bilqas and we demand that they increase the water level of the Bilqas waterway,” he said.
Dakahlia governor’s governor concurred: “Farmers are a priority. I ordered the Ministry of Interior’s undersecretary to urgently take the necessary steps to make water reach the area. I also ordered him to establish three bridges to hold water in the Nile waterway, remove the barriers in the way of water to the lands, and clean all the area’s waterways and drainage systems.”
