Egypt Taps Hidden Water Reserves

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31081, 9 June 1966, Page 10

Egypt Taps Hidden Water Reserves

<N.Z.P.A.-Reuter)

KHARGA (Egypt). Egypt is carrying out an ambitious programme for the reclamation of vast areas of arid land in the New Valley area of the Western Desert. Work on the scheme began in 1960, after the discovery of huge deposits of subterranean waters. When it is finished there will be a fertile region probably equal of the Nile area.

The New Valley is one of the biggest land reclamation projects in the world. It covers about eight million acres in a chain of depressions extending from the Sudanese borders, in the south, to the Mediterranean sea, in the north. Present plans aim at converting about two million acres into a cultivatable area. It is hoped that the reclaimed land will provide new homes for a large number of families at present crowded into the narrow green belt flanking the river Nile. Thousands of workers, engineers, geologists and agronomists, are working in the arid wilderness boring wells, laying water pipelines, and reclaiming scorched land. Nearly 43,000 acres have been reclaimed so far. Of these, about 28,000 acres have already been sown with wheat, beans and other crops. More than 6000 acres have been distributed to landless peasants and immigrants from Upper Egypt Each settler is given a plot of five acres, a house, a cow in calf, a donkey and a number of chickens. He is also given the equivalent of about £2O to help him to get his farm started. In the last five years, 282 families- have been rehabilitated in the New Valley. More- than 240 wells have been dug since the programme begun. Eath is cap-

able of irrigating about 250 acres. Mr Labib Shukeir, the Minister of Economy, said recently that more than £l4 million had already been spent on the reclamation of about 43,000 acres, each of which is bringing in an estimated annual income of £lBO.

Hidden away as it is in the bleak Western Desert, the New Valley presents a striking picture to the air traveller.

With startling abruptness, he suddenly looks down upon a region of green trees and healthy crops, completely surrounded by barren sand and rocks. The sand dunes and dusty hillocks give way to cultivated fields, and neat rows of houses add a further touch of unreality to the scene.

Several factories have been built in the New Valley for the dehydration of dates and the manufacture of bricks, water pipes, porcelain and milk products. Animal breeding is making good progress. Under a husbandry project, a number of Friesian, Hereford and other pedigree bulls have been imported to form a nucleus of a first-class herd. Carbon-14 tests carried out on samples of water taken from some wells in the Kharga, Baharia, and Siwa Oases in the valley, have shown that the age of water there is between 25,000 and 50,000 years. One theory among the experts has that thousands of millions of gallons of water have been seeping into this subterranean area for centuries, from equatorial Africa. They estimate that the water deposits are sufficient for more than eight centuries.

Australian Tanker. A 22,000-ton ml tanker, to be built at Whyalla, South Australia, will cost more than seven million dollars. B.H.P.’s ship building division will build the tanker for Shell Refining (Australia) Pty. Ltd.— Canberra, June 8.