CAIRO — Despite Egypt’s limited water resources, the Egyptian government is confident and decisive about cultivating 4 million undeveloped acres for agricultural use outside the Nile Valley and the Delta line. This new plan for farmland is not without difficulties, chief among which is the water shortage and the lack of adequate money for the reclamation of desert lands.

The project started with President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi's electoral program and consists of cultivating the land to achieve food security. It also aims to strengthen competitiveness within domestic and international markets and developing the agricultural production of each unit of land and water. The project was adopted by the government formed by Sisi following his victory, and the Ministry of Agriculture announced a set of measures to start land distribution and to develop implementation timelines.

On Sept. 19, Minister of Agriculture and Land Reclamation Adel El-Beltagy, the former supervisor of Sisi’s agricultural dossier, announced the start of the first phase of the project to plant the first million acres in 11 districts, mostly in the western desert and Toshka, in a huge celebration to mark the occasion of an Egyptian farming holiday.

The Egyptian government has adopted this plan at a time when the agricultural area in the ancient lands of the Nile valley and Delta are being eroded due to the continuous urbanization of agricultural land. However, in light of the serious actions taken by the Ministry of Agriculture to implement the project, there are still many questions about the possibility of providing water for the reclamation of new land, at a time when Egypt suffers from a severe shortage of water resources.