Managing Risks on Egypt Water Resources Security: Climate Change and Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) as Challenging Aspects

Abstract

Worldwide, availability of water resources is one of the most crucial economic and social concerns of the century. Egypt is considered as one of the most arid countries around the world. The Nile River is the main source of life for the Egyptians since it constitutes more than 97% of Egypt’s renewable water resources. Egypt faces great challenges with regard to water resources due to its fixed share of the Nile water, and scarcity of rainfall, groundwater and desalination capacities. Climate change causes an additional challenge for water availability and accessibility in Egypt. The Nile Basin upstream developments especially (the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam) will lead to more water shortage that would threaten the Country’s water security.

The Egyptian water resources system, including conventional and non-conventional water sources, is complex and multifaceted. The main challenge is to close the gap between the water resources available and the rising demand for freshwater, much more in the light of the current and future challenges that include unilateral upstream development, population increase, climate change and its implications within and outside the borders (variability in Nile flood regime, rainfall pattern, sea-level raise and seawater intrusion in the coastal groundwater aquifers).

The current regional perspective represents a major challenge to Egypt’s water security since the Nile Basin countries have their individual plans to develop their water resources. The amount of water required to implement these developing projects (hydropower dams and irrigated agriculture) exceeds the available water in the Nile River. This necessitates a basin-wide water agreement to coordinate such activities over the Nile.