(MENAFN- Daily News Egypt) This year's Sahara Expo is set to be one of the largest and most attended agricultural events in Africa and the Middle East. The 29th edition, which began on Saturday at the Cairo International Convention and Exhibition Centre (CICC), is focusing on modern and sustainable agriculture.
In recent years, Egypt has faced various challenges as a result of resource mismanagement and increasingly unsustainable consumption patterns, which put Egypt at risk of an energy and water crisis. Despite this, as one of the largest countries in the region, Egypt is a promising market with a great deal of opportunities.
Agriculture is ranked at the top of Egypt's first priorities, as seen by new land reclamation programmes: an area of 1.8m feddans is being reclaimed at an annual rate of 150,000 feddans.
Technicer for engineering services, a startup company in the field of sustainable energy, has a spot at this year's exhibition. The company's main line of work is finding sustainable eco-friendly solutions, while depending on solar energy in every aspect of its agricultural activities. At the exhibition, the company will showcase its products that are designed to improve the sector of sustainable agriculture, such as solar traps to combat insects and fungus, and solar pumping systems—a solar irrigation system to replace the conventional diesel irrigation.
Boosting Egypt's agricultural production is essential so as to keep up with the high rate of population growth and higher demand; yet, this must be achieved in a way that minimises any negative effects and provides the best usage of available resources.
In March, the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) granted Egypt $70m to finance the sustainable agriculture investment and livelihood (SAIL) projects to help adapt to the problems rising from climate change.