The Nile: Sudan and Egypt

The Nile River begins its trip north to the Mediterranean in the hills of Uganda and Ethiopia in central East Africa. The countries of Sudan and Egypt share the main part of the Nile system (Figure 6.32), which is their chief source of water. Although Sudan and Egypt have in common the Nile River, an arid climate, and Islam (Egypt is 94 percent Muslim; Sudan, 70 percent), they differ culturally and physically. Egypt, despite troubling environmental problems and major civil disruptions associated with the Arab Spring and government reform, is industrializing and continues to play an influential role in global affairs, whereas Sudan struggles with civil war, famine, and deep poverty.

FIGURE 6.32 The Sudan and Egypt subregion.

Sudan

Sudan is a large country with a small population—just 35 million people, less than half the 85 million in Egypt. The country has two distinct environmental zones. The dry steppes and hills of the south are home to animal herders. The lower, even drier Saharan north stretches to the border with Egypt. Although Sudan mostly consists of dry grassland and desert, it does contain the main stream of the Nile and its two chief tributaries, the White Nile and the Blue Nile. This river system brings water from the upland south that is used to irrigate fields of cotton for export. Most Sudanese live in a narrow strip of rural villages along these rivers (see Figure 6.21; see also Figure 6.32). Sudan’s only cities are clustered around the famed capital of Khartoum, where the White and Blue Niles join. 129. CHINA, LIBYA, AND OTHERS INVESTING IN SUDAN’S BOOMING ECONOMY

South Sudan gained independence from Sudan in 2011, only after decades of bloody civil war (discussed further in Chapter 7). The historical roots of animosity between these two states can be found in the politics of oil, religion, and race. The two countries share a large oil field. Islam has been the religion of Sudan for centuries, but it did not spread to the areas that now form South Sudan until the end of the nineteenth century, when Egyptians, backed by the British, subdued fierce resistance in that part of the country. The southern Sudanese people, for the most part, are either Christian or hold various indigenous beliefs, and most are black Africans of Dinka and Nuer ethnicity. In western Sudan (Darfur), there are also Muslim, Arabic-speaking black Africans. Despite the religion and language they share with the north, these southwestern Sudanese, as well as the Christians in what is now South Sudan, are antagonistic toward the Muslim, Arabic-speaking, lighter-skinned Sudanese of the north, who for thousands of years raided the upland south for slaves. In 1983, the Islamist-dominated government in Khartoum decided to make Sudan a completely Islamic state and imposed shari’a on the millions of non-Muslim southerners. As a result, Sudan became home to three civil wars and was classified as a failed state, meaning that the government had lost control and was no longer able to defend its citizens from armed uprisings.

The war that led to South Sudan’s independence was fought partially over the imposition of shari’a, and also over control of South Sudan’s modest oil reserves (see Figure 6.25). From 1983 to the present, this north-south civil war claimed 2 million lives, forced 4 million people to abandon their homes, and orphaned many thousands of children who were then forced to become soldiers for one side or the other. Since 2005, according to the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the government and the southern People’s Liberation Movement have for the most part continued to abide by the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement, and some 2.2 million people who had fled the southern Sudan conflict have moved back into the region. As a result, the already inadequate resources are being strained. 130. DOCUMENTARY RAISES PROFILE OF DARFUR CRISIS

A second civil war in Darfur, where the uniformly Muslim and Arabic-speaking population is nonetheless divided between those who support the current government in Khartoum and those who want greater local autonomy, seems to be winding down. Both groups want a share of Darfur’s oil reserves, and both are affected by the declining supplies of water. When one faction attempted to establish a secular state, the Khartoum government responded with force administered by an armed Arab militia called the janjaweed. There is strong evidence that the Khartoum government gave the janjaweed free rein to rape, rob, and kill its opponents, and helped by bombing villages just before the raiders arrived. These findings are backed by similar stories from thousands of refugees and by Human Rights Watch, an international organization that fights human rights abuses.

An international peacekeeping presence was slow to form, but the United Nations, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and numerous other countries sent aid for refugees, and a small peacekeeping force under the banner of the African Union reduced some of the violence against civilians. By June 2009, more than 400,000 Darfurians were dead and more than 2 million were displaced, many to the neighboring country of Chad, to which the conflict spread. In March 2009, Omar al-Bashir, president of Sudan, became the first sitting head of state to be indicted by the International Criminal Court in the Hague for his role in the killing of thousands of Darfuri villagers by the janjaweed. The protocol for arresting such a person had not yet been established, and it took until March 2013 for a warrant for his arrest to be issued. As of this writing, he remains at large. 291. STABILITY, EVEN IF SHORT-TERM, RETURNS TO SUDANESE REFUGEE CAMPS IN CHAD

Egypt

The Nile flows through Egypt in a somewhat meandering track more than 800 miles (about 1300 kilometers) long, from Egypt’s southern border with Sudan north to its massive delta in the southeastern Mediterranean. Egypt is so dry that the Nile Valley and the Nile Delta are virtually the only habitable parts of the country (see Figures 6.1 and 6.32). Ninety-six percent of Egypt is now desert, though archaeological evidence shows that cultivation was once possible far from the Nile basin. In recorded human history, however, it has only been the agriculture just along the banks of the Nile that has fed the country and provided high-quality cotton for textiles.

The Nile’s flow is no longer unimpeded. At the border with Sudan, the river is captured by a 300-mile-long (483-kilometer-long) artificial reservoir, Lake Nasser. The lake stretches back from the Aswan High Dam, completed in 1970 (see Figure 6.32), which controls flooding along the lower Nile and produces hydroelectric power for Egypt’s cities and industries. The downstream river environment, north of the dam, is greatly modified by the dam’s effects. Because the floodplain is no longer replenished annually by flood-waters carrying a fresh load of sediment and organic matter from upstream, irrigation and fertilizers are needed to maintain the productivity of the principal crops: cotton, grains, vegetables, sugarcane, and animal feed (Figure 6.33). The effects of the Aswan High Dam extend into the Mediterranean. Because the Nile Delta is no longer replenished with sediment, it is eroding away; furthermore, eastern Mediterranean fisheries are being affected by the lack of freshwater flow and the infusion of chemical fertilizers.

FIGURE 6.33 Life along the Nile in Egypt. Corn is transported by cart along a road that runs parallel to the Nile River in Egypt. The fields behind are irrigated with water taken directly from the Nile, as well as with water pumped up from underground aquifers. Courtesy Education Images/UIG/Getty Images

Egypt is the most populous of the Arab countries, with 75 million people in 2008 and 82.3 million in 2012, and it has been the most politically influential. Its geographic location, bridging Africa and Asia, gives it strategic importance, and the country plays an influential role in such global issues as world trade and in the peace process between the occupied Palestinian Territories and Israel. Even though Egypt has long been a recipient of U.S. aid, which limits its ability to take independent positions, it did oppose the 2003 war in Iraq, saying that the war was likely to increase terrorism. At the time, a headline in a Cairo newspaper read “Iraq Will Produce 100 Bin Ladens.” The demise of the regime of Hosni Mubarak and the associated political changes and economic hardships brought about by the Arab Spring led President Obama in 2013 to set the amount of U.S. aid to Egypt at $1 billion and to stipulate the conditions under which the aid would be allotted.

Egypt’s limited resources and its high rate of population growth mean that poverty levels are high—one-third of the population lives on just U.S.$2 a day. Although the cities are growing most rapidly (in 2013, Egypt was 43 percent urban; see Figure 6.23C), the number of people still living and working on the land has also increased. Those outside of cities constitute 32 percent of Egypt’s workforce but produce only 15 percent of the GDP. The Nile fields are no longer sufficient to feed Egypt’s people, and food must be imported. To afford this imported food for their families, rural men often migrate to neighboring countries, where they work to supplement the family income, leaving the women in charge of farming and village life. 287. EGYPT ORDERS ALL PIGS IN THE COUNTRY TO BE SLAUGHTERED

Agricultural Reform

In the 1950s, a socialist reform redistributed land from rich owners to poor farmers at very low rents so that the farmers would be able to support their families. In the late 1990s, a new law reversed the process—the result of structural adjustment programs (SAPs) imposed by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. The purpose of the new law was to increase the land’s productivity by cultivating it in large tracts managed with machinery, irrigation, and fertilizers. Control of the land would be returned to the original owners, who were allowed to increase rents in order to pay for the new investments. This reorganization of the agricultural system along the lines of green revolution strategies was meant to boost Egypt’s food security (its ability to feed its own people) and its ability to export water-intensive crops such as cotton and rice. Few of these intended benefits materialized, and the most noticeable result of the new law was that millions of farmers were forced off of their land and into the cities. Pressures for jobs and food from these millions of poor, urban dwellers were central to the protests of the Arab Spring that rocked Egypt in 2011 through 2013.

The Nile Delta

Egypt’s two main cities, Cairo and Alexandria, are both in the Nile Delta region. With 16 million people in its urban region, Cairo, at the head of the delta, is one of the most densely populated cities on earth. Alexandria, on the Mediterranean, has 4.5 million people (see the Figure 6.23 map). Egypt’s crowded delta region faces a crisis of clean water availability and the threat of waterborne disease and pollution. In Chapter 4, we discussed the problem of pollution around the Mediterranean. To address Egypt’s share of this problem, the recently created Ministry of the Environment has been seeking international contractors to treat industrial, agricultural, and urban solid and liquid wastes, which for years have been dumped untreated into the Nile and the Mediterranean. But an example from Cairo illustrates a disturbing pollution linkage between Europe and North Africa. A major industrial complex in Cairo, over which the Ministry of the Environment only loosely exerts its influence, recycles used car batteries sent to Egypt for disposal from all over Europe, because no disposal sites for the batteries are allowed in Europe. However, the recycling complex releases lead into the air in concentrations 30 times higher than those allowed by world health standards. The contaminated air blows across Cairo and into the eastern Mediterranean. Some children’s playgrounds in Cairo are so polluted that they would be considered hazardous waste sites in the United States and Europe; and of course eventually some of this pollution reenters the air and water of Europe.

The Slow Pace of Economic and Political Reform

In the 1990s, Egypt’s economy, for many years plagued by stagnation, inflation, and unemployment, appeared to be turning around. After years of SAPs (similar to those described above in the section on Egypt’s agricultural reform) aimed at fostering private enterprise and reducing the economic role of government, inflation was brought somewhat under control. Induced by tax incentives, multinational companies, such as Microsoft, McDonald’s, American Express, Löwenbräu of Germany, and three German automakers, opened subsidiaries in Egypt. For the ordinary working people of Egypt, however, this high-end development did not translate quickly into prosperity; instead, people lost public services as government spending was cut. Egypt’s economy, after having improved marginally, was dealt a double blow by the global recession that began in 2008 and by the political and economic turmoil that followed the Arab Spring. Unemployment rose to 13 percent overall, with roughly 9 percent of men and 25 percent of women unemployed.

A new national government, swept into power by the Arab Spring in 2012, became mired in political conflict that has diminished its ability to help improve the Egyptian economy. The economy actually contracted during the Arab Spring because of precipitous declines in tourism, manufacturing, and construction. Nevertheless, there are reasons for cautious optimism: The Egyptian public is now widely engaged in public debate, and many are eager for durable democratic reforms.