A good dozen farmers are sitting in a semicircle in the middle of a field, outside the small town of Quai, around 150 kilometers south of Cairo. The November sun is warm but no longer hot. An instructor explains to the men how they can better adapt their garlic crops to climate change.
Legend:
At the field school in Quai, Egypt, the farmers are learning how to better protect their garlic.
SRF/ Klaus Ammann
Saving water and keeping it in the ground is one motto. Protecting the garlic from storms, the other. The instructor explains to the farmers how both work on a demonstration field run by the German Society for International Cooperation (GIZ).
I harvest less and worse garlic.
The farmers can compare this field directly with their own and draw their lessons accordingly. Garlic is planted here with geraniums instead of in rows. The instructor explains that this helps to keep the water and fertilizer in the soil for longer.
Legend:
With new methods, the farmers of Beni Suef should become more successful in growing garlic.
SRF/ Klaus Ammann
Egypt is one of the top ten garlic exporters. Its cultivation has a millennia-long tradition here. But the traditional cultivation methods no longer work. “The sudden heavy rains in recent summers and then the higher temperatures are giving me problems,” says one of the farmers. “I harvest less and worse garlic.”
The water level of the Nile is falling
Egypt has been suffering from water shortages for years. The population only has half as much water per capita as the UN actually defined as the minimum.
We tell them don’t water during the day or all the water will evaporate and the plants will suffer from heat stress.
Meanwhile, the population is growing rapidly and the water level of the Nile – from which most of the water comes – is sinking due to climate change. In addition, the southern neighboring country Ethiopia is filling a new reservoir on the upper reaches of the river.
Legend:
The inhabitants of Aswan depend on the water of the Nile.
SRF/ Klaus Ammann
Garlic is fundamentally resilient and farmers can use simple means to adapt to the consequences of climate change, says GIZ project manager Waleed Ramadan. “We tell them don’t water during the day, otherwise all the water will evaporate and the plants will suffer from heat stress.”
When the farmers irrigate their fields in the early morning and at dusk, they get by with up to a quarter less water. Even more savings would be possible if farmers could equip their fields with irrigation systems that only emit water drop by drop. However, the cooperative lacks the money for this.
Assem Mohammed is an economist and researches at the Central Laboratory for Climate in Agriculture in Giza near Cairo. Projects like that of GIZ in Quai must also offer farmers economic prospects, he emphasizes.
Most garlic farmers in Egypt only sold to the big greengrocers. While these put a sizable margin on the vegetables, the farmers get very little. A garlic farmer today earns about four times less than a taxi driver, emphasizes the environmental economist.
Adaptation to climate change must therefore be combined with an improvement in the economic situation. Otherwise the farmers are in danger of losing their jobs.
This has also been recognised, explains Waleed Ramadan from GIZ. Those responsible for the garlic cooperative would be shown how they can export directly or sell to Egyptian end customers without having to go through the dealers in order to increase their margins.
Poor infrastructure causes water shortages
Around 750 kilometers further south is the city of Aswan, which also gave its name to the famous dam. Here, the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation SDC financed the construction of a drinking water pumping station.
Since July, three pumps have been taking turns pumping up to 800 kilometers of water, which is piped here from a sewage treatment plant on the banks of the Nile, to a higher-lying part of the city. Aswan has around 600,000 inhabitants.
Legend:
This pumping station supplies the residents of the city of Aswan with water.
SRF/ Klaus Ammann
Despite the immediate proximity to the Nile, there is a lack of drinking water in the poorer quarters. On the one hand, the bad infrastructure is to blame. Water pipes are dirty or in poor condition, causing large amounts of water to be wasted. On the other hand, there is a lack of awareness of the value of water and a functioning water infrastructure.
In recent years, climate change has made things even more difficult. Long periods of heat, during which more water is evaporated and at the same time more is used, put pressure on the water supply. Sudden extreme rainfall also overwhelms the water treatment.
Waited for water for days
The SDC project therefore works on several levels. The infrastructure is being improved in cooperation with the local authorities and the public water supply company. The pumping station, which costs around four million Swiss francs, is the heart of this part of the project.
From the reservoir at the upper end of the facility, 4,000 households and 40,000 residents are reliably supplied with drinking water via natural pressure.
For the two dozen women and men in the community center in El-Khattariya, “a dream has come true”. Previously, they would have waited for days to fill their containers the moment water flowed through the pipes. Or they would have carried water miles away.
Every household now has a water meter. This allows people – in most households the women take care of it – to monitor consumption and check the bills from the water utility.
Raising awareness is therefore another important pillar of the project. Water and the reason why climate change is making it rarer in the city on the Nile is also a topic in schools. In the “environmental club”, the students design posters on the topic, plant – and water – trees and visit a sewage treatment plant.
Drops on a hot stone
Whether new methods for growing garlic, raising awareness or upgrading the infrastructure for the drinking water supply: in Egypt – as in most countries in the Global South – adaptation to climate change has different faces and usually goes hand in hand with existing development cooperation.
One thing is clear: the two projects are just a drop in the bucket. While a few million francs are invested here over several years, experts reckon that hundreds of billions of francs would be needed every year – and the trend is rising.