Publication Details |
| Category | Text Publication |
| Reference Category | Journals |
| DOI | 10.1016/j.ejrh.2023.101537 |
Licence  |
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| Title (Primary) | Egypt's waterways conservation campaigns under growing intrinsic demand and Nile upstream damming |
| Author | Fouad, S.S.; Heggy, E.; Ramah, M.; Abotalib, Z.A.; Palmer, E.M.; Jomaa, S.; Weilacher, U. |
| Source Titel | Journal of Hydrology: Regional Studies |
| Year | 2023 |
| Department | ASAM |
| Volume | 50 |
| Page From | art. 101537 |
| Language | englisch |
| Topic | T5 Future Landscapes |
| Keywords | Nile; Waterways; Water conservation; Awareness campaigns; Landscape architecture |
| Abstract | The Nile River is the primary water source for populous and hyper-arid Egypt. However, it suffers from the backfilling of
its extensive network of waterways and increasing encroachments along its banks.
The Nile’s waterways are among the world’s oldest and largest water irrigation
systems. As an integral component of the Nile water system, they are vital in
sustaining agriculture, inhabitants’ quality of life in urban and rural
settings, and various ecosystem services. Therefore, raising public awareness
and a sense of connectivity with the conservation of these waterways is one of
the primary mitigation strategies for addressing the dire water deficit in
Egypt resulting from rapid population growth and flow alteration associated
with increased upstream damming. The large-scale degradation of the waterways
system, observed since the mid-1980s, is perplexing, as Egyptians were
historically more oriented to preserving the Nile ecosystem and the
interrelated landscape for thousands of years. To assess the root cause of this
phenomenon, we review the waterways’ public conservation campaigns and explore
the grounds for their inefficiencies, failures, and subsequent impacts on
transboundary water management. To achieve this objective, we compiled several
research publications, local technical reports, and ground observations. Our
results show that negligence toward the waterways accelerated during the
nation’s transition from water sufficiency in the 1970s (1400 m3/capita/year)
to the onset of scarcity in the 1980s (<1000 m3/capita/year).
The water authorities’ delay of 15 years in implementing conservation
campaigns, which were unhurriedly initiated in the mid-1990s, along with
unsustainable landscape transformations, led to nationwide water misuse and
sanitary degradation of the Nile’s infrastructure. Considering the findings of
our review, we provide recommendations for improving the efficiency of
waterways conservation campaigns. Our findings could be applied to other Nile
riparian nations with similar environmental and socioeconomic settings. |
| Persistent UFZ Identifier | https://www.ufz.de/index.php?en=20939&ufzPublicationIdentifier=28008 |
| Fouad, S.S., Heggy, E., Ramah, M., Abotalib, Z.A., Palmer, E.M., Jomaa, S., Weilacher, U. (2023): Egypt's waterways conservation campaigns under growing intrinsic demand and Nile upstream damming J. Hydrol. Reg. Stud. 50 , art. 101537 10.1016/j.ejrh.2023.101537 |
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