December 2010: The World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors approved two new loans for Egypt in support of two projects: Farm-level Irrigation Modernization Project ($ 100 million) and additional financing for the Egypt National Railways Restructuring Project ($ 330 million).
Agriculture remains vital in Egypt employing 30% of the country’s workforce and supporting 55% of the population even as agriculture’s share of GDP falls in a diversifying economy. On December 14, 2010, the World Bank approved a US$ 100 million loan to support Egypt’s Farm-level Irrigation Modernization Project (FIMP).
The project underpins the Government of Egypt’s (GoE) Strategy of Sustainable Agricultural Development 2030, in the first phase of a longer-term national program to modernize irrigation on 5 million feddans (a feddan equals about 0.42 hectare). The project aims to increase agricultural profitability and improve access to higher-quality water for around 140,000 small-scale farmers on 200,000 feddans in the command areas of Mahmoudia, Manaifa and Meet Yazid, located in the Nile Delta.
The project comprises two components. The first component supports marwa (farm-level ditches) and farm-level irrigation modernization in the command areas noted above. In these locations, branch canal and mesqa (tertiary channels that receive water from branch canals) improvements have been carried out or are currently ongoing.
The second component of the project aims to enhance farmer knowledge and the associated land improvement and crop production technologies. The project includes a new approach to the delivery of services by the Ministry of Agriculture and Land Reclamation that is based on working with farmer's groups on participatory planning and project implementation.
Railways Restructuring Additional Financing
On December 14, 2010, the World Bank’s Board of Executive Directors approved a loan for Egypt in the amount of $ 330 million as additional financing for the Egypt National Railways Restructuring Project.
The additional financing will contribute to achieving the objective of the Egypt National Railways Restructuring Project (ENRRP), which is to assist the Government in improving the reliability, efficiency and safety of the railways’ services through signaling and track renewal investments and the modernization of Egypt National Railways (ENR) management and operating practices in order to enhance the railways’ sector responsiveness to economic and social needs and to strengthen the financial viability of ENR.
Passengers and businesses are two principal target beneficiaries of ENRRP. Low-income passengers in particular, will benefit from safer, more reliable and faster services; whereas businesses, with respect to freight transport, will have access to a much larger range of more reliable rail services.
The additional financing will finance the modernization of signaling along the Beni Suef –Asyut line, between Alexandria - Asyut. When completed, this section will continue the modernization of signaling systems on the line Alexandria – Asyut, which is part of the busiest corridor of the railways network, with a view to make it the most modern in terms of safety standards.
The original project is financing needed investments in signaling systems from Arab el-Raml to Alexandria (on the Cairo-Alexandria line), in addition to financing priority track-renewal works for 200 km of track along the Cairo-Aswan line (149 km on four sections of track) and the Benha-Port Said line (51 km on two sections of track).
For more information, please visit the Projects website.
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