The filling regime and operational methods of GERD will affect Egypt, in particular through its impact on the operation of its Aswan High Dam (AHD) which aims at mitigating the high variability of the Nile River flow. l located on the Blue Nile River in Ethiopia . Security implications of growing water scarcity in Egypt. Water Policy, 16(4), 595-608. As mentioned above, Ethiopias dam-construction strategy is intimately linked with large-scale foreign investment in the agrarian sector and specifically in areas near the artificial reservoirs created by the dams. Egypt Forced to Negotiate on Nile Dam. Could the Nile dispute be an opportunity to boost freshwater technology? At 6,000 MW, the dam will be the largest hydroelectric power plant in Africa when completed at 2017(IPoE, 2013). According to this narrative, the Blue Nile, or Abay in Amharic, is a purely Ethiopian river. Ethiopian general threatens military force to defend Nile dam as negotiations with Egypt falter. Cairo - U.S. Special Envoy to the Horn of Africa Ambassador Mike Hammer met with senior Egyptian government officials on July 25 to advance a diplomatic resolution on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) that supports the water needs, economy, and livelihood of all Egyptians, Sudanese, and Ethiopians. Revisiting hydro-hegemony from a benefitsharing perspective: the case of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam. The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, a 1.1-mile-long concrete colossus, is set to become the largest hydropower plant in Africa. Another argument Egypt might adduce concerns the DoP. Since 2015, technical reports on the potential impacts of the dam have failed to reach a consensus within the TNC (Maguid, 2017). On March 4, 1909, the Copyright Act of 1909 became law, making infringement of a copyright a federal crime for the first time. Despite several tripartite meetings between November 2013 and January 2014, no agreement was reached on the implementation of the IPoE recommendations and controversies were evolving around the constitution of a trilateral committee. Hence, it is hard to see how Egypt could make a compelling argument that it has been harmed by the Dam. The disadvantages for Egypt and Sudan are the possibility of reduced river flow, although this is only really a problem during the years of filling the dam. The GERD has become a new reality challenging the traditional dynamics in the Nile River Basin. Officials in Addis Ababa argue that the GERD will have no major impact on water flow into the Nile, instead arguing that the hydropower dam will provide benefits to countries in the region, including as a source of affordable electric power and as a major mechanism for the management of the Nile, including the mitigation of droughts and water salinity. The CFA was a political success for the eight upstream states such as Ethiopia as it favoured those states and isolated the downstream states of Egypt and Sudan and made them appear recalcitrant. Egyptian players abroad: Mostafa Mohamed's Nantes defeated at PSG, Trezeguet.. Italy Serie A results & fixtures (25th matchday), Egypts Prosecution investigates Hoggpool, Six European nations express concern over growing violence in Palestinian territories, Egyptian Premier League fixtures (21st matchday), US official says Biden expected to tighten rules on US investment in China. Ethiopia argues that developing this resource is crucial to its economic development, and to overcoming poverty and famine, that have plagued the country in the past. After announcing the dam's construction, and with a view to the increasing tensions, the Ethiopian government invited both Egypt and Sudan to form an International Panel of Experts (IPoE) to solicit understanding of the benefits, costs and impacts of the GERD. It was in the hope of protecting Lake Turkana against such threats that it was listed as a World Heritage Site. The US has revived diplomatic efforts to resolve the dispute sparked by Ethiopia's Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) project on the Nile. the study highlights the importance of weighing up the advantages and disadvantages of counter-hegemonic tactics in general, and of large dam projects in particular, and . Perhaps even more consequential is the fact that this agreement granted Egypt veto power over future Nile River projects. Given the advancement of the dam construction - the GERD being, as of March 2015, 40% complete, according to Ethiopia - Egypt had good reason to reconsider its position (RANE, 2015). The writer is a professor of political science at the UAEs Zayed and Cairo universities, *A version of this article appears in print in the 9 July, 2020 edition ofAl-Ahram Weekly, Spain La Liga results & fixtures (24th matchday). Cooperation among the three countries has never been more important as demand for water rises, she added, due to factors such as population growth, urbanization and industrialization. This is on the basis of the principles of State succession as outlined in the Vienna Convention on the Succession of States (VCSS). The Political Deadlock on the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam. In addition, no independent, multilateral Environmental and Social Impact Assessments has been carried out suggesting that Ethiopia is reneging from the 2015 Declaration of Principles (Kandeel, 2020). (2014). Article 5 requires that watercourse states utilise an international watercourse in an equitable and reasonable manner and creates the duty to cooperate in the protection and development of the watercourse. It could be a treaty or merely a political declaration as the name implies. Cham, Switzerland: Springer International Publishing AG, 79-110. Consequently, it suits Egypts interests in this context to argue that the DoP is binding, that it precludes any net loss of flow and therefore that the use of the Dam for irrigation purposes is prohibited. Cairo . per year, that would constitute a drought, to push the three countries to adhere to their obligations in accordance with the rules of international law in order to reach a fair and balanced solution to the issue of the GERD, 1929 Anglo-Egyptian Treaty and 1959 Agreement. Already, the United States has threatened to withhold development aid to Ethiopia if the conflict is not resolved and an agreement reached. The dispute resolution committee could be made up of the Nile Council of Ministers (Nile-COM), which includes the ministers in charge of water affairs in all member states of the Nile River Basin. Ethiopia, with a population of more than 115 million people and Projected to be 230 million by 2050. An Ethiopian national flag is seen at the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam in Guba, Ethiopia, on February 19, 2022. This paper discusses the challenges and benefits of the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), which is under construction and expected to be operational on the Blue Nile River in Ethiopia in a few years. All three countries have a vested interest in a properly operated dam. Basically, Ethiopia should cooperate with the other riparian states in developing and adopting an effective drought mitigation protocol, one that includes the possibility that GERD managers may have to release water from the reservoir, when necessary, to mitigate droughts. We shall begin with the former. Ethiopia's Grand Renaissance Dam. The current global energy crisis may help in this regard in the sense that Egyptians may find the allure of discounted hydroelectric energy stronger than ever before. This is a matter of acute concern given that Egypt depends on the Nile for about 97% of its irrigation and drinking water. In the end, all 11 riparian states must understand that the way forward calls for the establishment of a meaningful resource-sharing agreement, one that sees and recognizes the Nile River as a regional watercourse. Despite the fact that newly independent Sudan in the late 1950s was literally forced by a dominant Egypt into a highly asymmetrical water-sharing arrangement, Sudan has rarely challenged this arrangement. It can be demand-driven, typically caused by population growth, and supply-driven, typically caused by decreasing amounts of fresh water often resulting from climate change or a result of societal factors such as poverty. Trilateral talks mediated by the United States and World Bank from November 2019 to February 2020 collapsed as Ethiopia rejected a binding agreement with Egypt and Sudan on the filling and operation of the GERD, which led to both downstream countries requesting intervention from the UN Security Council (UNSC) in May 2020 (Kandeel, 2020). No water at all was allocated to Ethiopia. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) takes an expansionist view towards decolonisation as seen in the Chagos Islands Advisory Opinion, in which it allowed the decolonisation agenda to trump the UKs lack of consent to any contentious proceedings. Egypt has also escalated its call to the international community to get involved. khadsyy Plus. At that point, the lake that . Workers move iron girders from a crane at the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD), near Guba, Ethiopia, on Dec. 26, 2019. Flashcards. This represents a new challenge to the basins current hydro-political regime and status quo, as it may drive Sudans interest in renegotiating its current quota(Link et al., 2012;Whittington et al., 2014). A major reason the GERD is so controversial today is that it has not been subjected to thorough safety and impact studies, which could pose a grave threat to downriver nations. While the water will return to its normal state before reaching Egypt, the damage to these populations will be permanent. Feb 11th 2021 DAMS HAVE several uses. A significant segment of local opinion is also aware of the well-known problems that come with mega-dams wherever they are built, among them population displacements and resettlement, reductions in the quality of life, the spread of waterborne diseases, salinisation and the loss of productive and profitable lands, more intense competition over the remaining available land, and losses of cultural and historic heritage. Monday January 2, 2017. The Grand Renaissance Dam and prospects for cooperation on the Eastern Nile. Match. As a hydroelectric project, the dam is expected to generate 6,000 megawatts of electricity. However, Sudans future water requirements will likely exceed its water quota as defined in the 1959 Agreement. Ethiopia could argue that those imperial powers did not foresee the decolonisation of Africa and that this represented a watershed event that profoundly changed the foundation on which the Nile Water Treaties were constructed. when did construction of the dam begin? If it is allowed to reach dangerous levels, water scarcity has the potential to trigger conflicts. In order to sustain this benefit in the long run, Ethiopias neighbouring countries will have to continue to purchase hydroelectric energy, and rainfall will have to fall at the same rate on the Ethiopian Plateau. Even then, the initial studies did not extend beyond the borders with Kenya. Thus, it is only through cooperation that Egypt, Ethiopia, Sudan, and the other riparians can peacefully resolve conflicts over the Nile and achieve the type of water use that will contribute significantly to regional economic and human development. Ethiopia says it will take a further four to six years to fill up the reservoir to its maximum flood season capacity of 74bcm. However, another trend stresses the need to approach the question from a broader and more holistic perspective. These run from rising rivalry between Egypt and Ethiopia to a festering border war between Ethiopia and neighboring Sudan. But with a generation capacity of 6.45GW, the Ethiopian government quoted the project as vital to the country's economic growth. This dam, set to be the largest in Africa in terms of power capacity, continues to cause disagreement between Ethiopia, Sudan and Egypt on filling and operation strategies. Ethiopia Needs the United States to Act as an Honest Broker in the Nile . Location l Formerly called as project x then known as the Millennium Dam then it renamed to Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam. It also codified the principles of equitable and reasonable utilisation and no significant harm (essentially importing from the Watercourses Convention). That seems unlikely given that the DoP concerns the Dam alone and was agreed only between Egypt, Ethiopia and Sudan; whereas the Nile Waters Treaties concern the whole Nile Basin and involve many more states. For nearly a century, as a legacy of colonialism, Egypt enjoyed what Tekuya referred to as a hydro-hegemony over the Nile; despite Ethiopia contributing 86% to its waters. Perhaps the most significant project in the 2003 plan was the Chemoga-Yeda Hydroelectric Project, a series of five small dams on Blue Nile tributaries and two dams on the Genale River with a couple more envisioned for a later phase. It is therefore intrinsically connected with the question of land ownership. Disadvantages Slow process Could be washed to the wrong direction Start up costs Lesson 4: Long term investment, It can't cope with he propagation rate of water hyacinth. It simultaneously expects that this role will change Ethiopias international status from a country perceived as poor and dependent on foreign aid to a regional power able to provide vital resources to its surrounding region. Ethiopia's Grand Renaissance Dam: Ending Africa's Oldest Geopolitical Rivalry? For example, Ethiopians and Egyptians are more likely to understand and appreciate the challenges that they face, particularly in the areas of water security, climate change, food production, and poverty alleviation, if they regularly interact with each other and engage in more bottom-up, participatory and inclusive approaches to the resolution of their conflicts. L'Europe en Formation, 365(3), 99-138. Both Egypt and Ethiopia could make arguments in support of their positions. Across Ethiopia, poor farmers and rich business executives alike . Egypts Nile Water Policy under Sisi: Security Interests Promote Rapprochement with Ethiopia. Second came the 2015 Declaration of Principles (DoP) which concerned the Dam specifically (rather than the Nile more broadly). Maguid, M.A. Government of the United States of America. The Eastern Nile Basin is of critical geopolitical importance to the Niles overall hydro-political regime. Salman, S.M.A. Learn the history of Toronto from the city's official website. Review a brief history of copyright in the United States. This is hardly a revelation, as this strategy has long been foremost in the minds of the ruling elites in Addis Ababa and supported by the international powers. In fact, about 85 % of the overall Nile flow originates on Ethiopian territory (Swain, 2011). This is because it is traditionally understood to refer to waterways that form intrinsic parts of international boundaries. Ethiopia has never 'consumed' significant shares of the Nile's water so far, as its previous political and economic fragility in combination with a lack of external financial support, due to persistent Egyptian opposition to projects upstream, prevented it from implementing large-scale projects. (eds.). Ethiopia is pinning its hopes of economic development and power generation on the Blue Nile dam, which Egypt fears will imperil its water supply.
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