Alarming land losses
Posted 28 June 2011, by The Editor, The Egyptian Gazette, 213.158.162.45/~egyptian/
The UN report on desertification shows that Egypt ranks first among countries facing a serious desertification problem. It rings alarm bells about the high risk of losing the best fertile soil.
According to the report, Egypt is losing 3.5 feddans of arable land in the Nile Delta each and every hour due to urban expansion. This alarming rate should prompt harsh penalties, a close follow-up and monitoring of agricultural acreage.
Local experts dropped another bombshell when they said that in the last three months alone building on agricultural land increased to such an extent that five feddans were lost per hour on average. If this rate were maintained, the waste of arable land would reach 43,000 feddans in one year.
The state of chaos and the absence of adequate supervision in the wake of the January 25 revolution have encouraged profiteering and personal greed at the expense of public interest.
The Government is urgently required to prioritise this issue and pass clear directives to governors and agricultural directorates, not only to pull down buildings constructed in the past few months but to force violators to restore barren land to its former condition.
This is not the time for accepting financial compensation as the case has usually been in the past few years. Decisiveness is the only way to deal with law breakers, no matter what justification violators come up with.
Officials concerned are expected to review agricultural maps across the country to make a comparison with available areas. Plenty of vast areas have already been lost in the past decade or so due to laxity and indifference.
It would be utterly disgraceful if a country whose ancient civilisation was based on agriculture lost its fertile land out of its own will and was forced to turn to desert reclamation for agricultural production.
