By

Abdullah A. Saber

Botany Department, Faculty of Science, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt

(abdullah_elattar@sci.asu.edu.eg)

Egypt are likely to experience

increasing multiple pressures in

the future as a result of:

I. very high predicted

population growth.

II. industrial development.

III. land use change.

IV. Finally building of some

dams on the main branches

of River Nile controlling and

negatively affecting River

Nile-Egyptian water

amount.

The New Valley Governorate

“or El Wadi El Gedid” is the

largest governorate in Egypt.

It is stretched for about

440,098 km² in the Western

Desert (about 44% of the

total area of Egypt and ca.

66% of the Western Desert).

It comprises three main

oases; El-Kharga Oasis, El-

Dakhla Oasis and El-Farafra

Oasis.

The Western Desert contains an extensive aquifer system with

high potentialities of renewable fresh groundwater nominated

as The Nubian Sandstone Aquifer System.

This aquifer represents the sole resource of freshwater in the

Western Desert.

El-Farafra Oasis is one of the aforementioned oases that

occupies the heart of the Egyptian Western Desert.

Special interest was given to this Oasis because it is my Ph.D.

study area and didn’t been studied before very well

hydrologically and phycologically.

In El-Farafra Oasis, The principle head source of urban,

irrigation and domestic purposes is the water naturally flowing

from thermal springs or drilled wells “pumping water

continuously without any control”.

This type of irrigation is carried out through a peculiar system

of side channels specially designed to cope with mechanism of

supply of water.

Hydrochemistry of some hot springs “called Ain in Arabic” and

drilled wells:

Springs (called Ain in Arabic):

6,5

7

7,5

8

8,5

pH values

summer 2011

winter 2012

02000400060008000

1000012000

14000

16000

summer 2011

winter 2012

EC (μS cm-1 )

(EC values ranged between 219-

953 μS cm-1 )

Drilled Wells (called Bir in Arabic):

5,5

6

6,5

7

7,5

8

summer 2011

winter 2012

pH

v

alu

e

Drilled Wells (called Bir in Arabic):

0

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

summer 2011

winter 2012

EC

(μ

S c

m-1

)

(EC values ranged between 173.7-756 μS cm-1 )

Most of this freshwater isn’t under any control

and couldn’t be greatly managed and used

for achieving the best percentage of

irrigation and desert reclamation, but

Seepage into the desert land + water coming

from washing agricultural lands

Leading to formation of waterlogged lands

"wetlands"

So it will be difficult to be easily reclaimed in the

future due to salts accumulation

The main problem????

So, It is very important to:

1) put the suitable strategies to manage the renewable

underground freshwater in El-Farafra Oasis, especially it

contains a large flat area suitable for reclamation.

2) achieve the best use of water for urban and irrigation

purposes.

3) Finally and in general, reclaim the Western Desert as

possible, to depend on ourselves in food production "self-

sufficiency".

Results and Outlook

Cultivation and isolation of some different soil “edaphic“ algal

strains from the Oasis.

Results and Outlook

some of the isolated strains are the first time to be recorded in

Egyptian algal flora such as Westiellopsis prolifica Janet. Its

identification is genetically identified by Dr. Marco Cantonati

(MUSE- Trento-Italy)

This taxon is very salt tolerant and is widely used as a

biofertilizer, increasing the yield productivity of some plants

such as wheat.

Generally, algae are known by its ability to improve the

physico-mechanical features of desert lands by increasing

their water-holding capacity through secretion of many

types of polysaccharides. At the same time, algae could be

easily cultivated under special conditions, producing high

mass growth.

In lab, we have already started through the next coming

days to apply this strain and others as biofertilizer,

especially on economically-important, non-salt tolerant

plants.

This trial will be applied on desert soils collected from El-

Farafra Oasis, expecting positive results based on

preliminary tests (positive growth of seeds germination).

Desert soil

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