EDUCATION AND TRANSLATION THROUGH IMAGES FIELDTRIPS AND REPORTS GUIDE THE NEED TO INTEGRATE SCIENCE, ENGINEERS AND POLICY- AN EGYPTIAN CASE STUDY

Egyptians depend on the Nile. With population explosion 82 million, 99.9% live along the Nile, Egypt’s growth cannot be sustained without eventual import of water and adjustments in irrigation practices. This is driven by increased water consumption by other nations in the Nile Basin and projected climate change resulting in a drier watershed. The high dam prevents annual flooding, provides needed electricity and allows year round agriculture, but also contributes to ~10 billions of gallons/year of consumptive loss, rising water levels, destruction of farmland, buildings and world class antiquities.

The Wadi El Sa’ayada Reclamation Project, an Egyptian/Italian joint venture near Edfu, illustrates spreading land reclamation cropping up along the desert road from Aswan to Abydos. From 1998 to 2002, 6,742 of 11,736 ha were cultivated. Due to lack of hydrogeologic understanding, portions of Nile terraces 50 m above the Nile are flooded, salinized and abandoned. Hundreds of mudbrick structures collapsed, and portions of valley farmed over millennia are abandoned. Hierakonpolis Templetown Site surface pools increased from 3 (1999) to >33 (2005). The mean depth to water decreased from 4.2 m (1898), 2.2 m (1967) to <1.0 m (2005). Images spanning a decade imbedded in official annual reports to government ministers and on site field trips reveal change through time of salts leaching from soils and evaporating from irrigation waters creating extensive damage to croplands, mud-brick homes and archeological sites. Tiles and drainage canals cannot handle added volumes of irrigation rerturn water. Traditional farming and land use practices must change to sustain the rising population and limit use of available water. Costly water control projects include multiple pumping stations and dewatering wells at Karnak, Luxor, Osireion, Edfu, and elsewhere.

Government officials are becoming aware and asking for solutions to their water sustainability problems. There is need for substantial funding, communication, cooperation and coordination amongst politicians, ministries, hydrogeologists, soil scientists, agriculture experts, educators and community planners when undertaking large-scale development projects that require knowledge of geologic and hydrogeologic framework.