Global Map of Irrigation Areas

Egypt

The area equipped for irrigation was reported at 3 422 178 ha [EG01]. The figures refer to year 2002. Irrigated area per governorate is documented in the table below.

Irrigated area was distributed within the governorates by using AFRICOVER data on land cover [EG02]. First irrigated area was assigned to polygons classified as completely covered by irrigated crops and in a second step (if necessary) to polygons classified as mixture between irrigated crops and other land cover. However, in some governorates the area reported as irrigated by the statistics was still larger than the total area of polygons classified by AFRICOVER as irrigated or partly irrigated. Therefore for the governorates of Port Said, Cairo, Ismailia, Suez, Fayoum and Gharbia the difference was assigned to areas adjacent to irrigated areas and classified as bare soil.

References

[EG01]: Ministry of Agriculture and Land Reclamation. 2003. Agricultural statistics, Volume 2, summer and Nili crops 2002. Sector of Economic Affairs. Arab Republic of Egypt.
[EG02]: FAO. 2005. AFRICOVER, Egypt - Spatially Aggregated Multipurpose Landcover database, FAO, Rome, Italy, http://www.africover.org, 13/12/2004

Distribution of irrigated area in Egypt per governorate: