CAIRO (Reuters) – Sitting in her sister\u2019s apartment on a noisy Cairo street, Rania Sayed one day hopes to leave a city that is becoming more congested as Egypt\u2019s population ticks up to 100 million, a milestone it will pass next month.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Like many others, she wants to move to one of the new satellite settlements being built for a booming population whose rapid growth President Abdel-Fattah al-Sisi has identified as one of Egypt\u2019s biggest challenges alongside terrorism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI want to move them (her two children) to a place where people have better mentalities, where there is education,\u201d said the 36-year-old resident of the Ard Al Lewa district, where rows of apartment blocks rise above dusty, unpaved streets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cUnfortunately, things are very difficult in places like this…so I hope to be able to live to a good social standard.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Egypt\u2019s 100 millionth person is expected to be clocked up on the official statistics agency\u2019s digital counter in central Cairo in February.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The newborn will join a nation where six people in ten are under 29 years old, said Aleksandar Bodiroza, representative of the U.N. populations fund in Egypt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Many Arab and African countries are struggling with rising populations. But in Egypt the pressures are acute, because 97% of its people live on just 8% of its territory, crowded along the Nile, Bodiroza added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Creating new space for housing, schools and hospitals is a priority as Egypt\u2019s population grows by 2.5 million people a year, he said. In inhabited areas, 1,400 people are packed into every square kilometer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The biggest problem is jobs. The workforce will reach 80 million within 10 years, the World Bank says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But to create enough jobs, annual economic growth needs to be at least triple the population growth rate, said Radwa El-Swaify, head of research at Pharos, a Cairo financial firm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Based on population growth of 2.5% this would require 7.5% GDP growth, compared with the government\u2019s forecast of up to 5.9% for the current fiscal year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In addition, Egypt\u2019s economy could be hit by water shortages caused by climate change and a Nile dam being built upstream by Ethiopia. Infrastructure, including roads and public transport, will also come under pressure as the population grows.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThirty years ago this whole area was agricultural land,\u201d said Nabil Rawash, 60, who also lives in Ard El Lewa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBut with the overcrowding and population growth, people started coming here to build,\u201d he added, standing in a street packed with people and cars.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Officials say they have managed to bring down fertility rates thanks to a \u201cTwo is Enough\u201d campaign challenging the tradition of large families in rural areas.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
This is aimed at more than 1.1 million poor families with up to three children. The Social Solidarity Ministry has trained volunteers to encourage people to have fewer children.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cDuring 2019, we have conducted 2,680,000 home visits,\u201d said Desiree Labib, project director at the ministry. \u201cAmong these visits 407,000 women have asked to be referred to family planning clinics.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
She pointed to a U.N. study which found the fertility rate dipped to 3.1 in 2018 from 3.5 in 2014.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cIf we apply more discipline, so that families have less children, we can reach fertility rates of 2.1 by 2032,\u201d said Abdelhamid Sharaf El Din, a senior statistics official.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That still means the population will grow to 153 million by 2052, but if the fertility rate were 3.4 it would hit 191 million, he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Either way, the government needs to do something about congestion in Cairo, home to about one in five Egyptians. It is planning to start moving ministries as soon as June.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But for many, moving there is not an option due to lack of transport and jobs, said Timothy Kaldas, non-resident fellow at the Tahrir Institute for Middle East Policy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cThe over-centralization of Egypt\u2019s state and economy has led to this overwhelming concentration of Egyptians in one metropolis,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
CAIRO (Reuters) – Sitting in her sister\u2019s apartment on a noisy Cairo street, Rania Sayed one day hopes to leave a city that is becoming more congested as Egypt\u2019s population ticks up to 100 million, a milestone it will pass next month. Like many others, she wants to move to one of the new satellite settlements being built for a… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":136,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3989","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3989","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/136"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3989"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3989\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3990,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3989\/revisions\/3990"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3989"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3989"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3989"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}