Upper Egypt’s natural resources will be tapped into to develop the region through the Golden Triangle Project, the second largest developmental project run by the Egyptian government.
The project seeks to establish a new industrial capital city through constructing a global, touristic, mining, economic, commercial, and industrial centre. It will also create a logistic and economic centre northwest of Safaga, which will operate mining activities to make use of the Eastern Desert’s Golden Triangle. This area extends from Edfu, south of Qena, in the Nile Valley to Marsa Alam on the Red Sea coast and Safaga in the north.
The project will sit on an area of 6,000 square km and will develop Upper Egypt through constructing an industrial, agricultural, touristic, and commercial zone. The proposed time frame for project construction is two years.
A separate entity will implement the project under the umbrella of the cabinet, to build the project as quickly as possible, and at the highest level of efficiency.
The proposed projects for the Golden Triangle developmental project include mining projects, such as using phosphate ore and constructing fertiliser factories. Other projects will utilise raw materials to manufacture cement from clay and limestone and produce gasoline from oil-based clay.
The project also entails tapping into agricultural lands in Qena governorate and constructing a number of touristic resorts in Dendara, Laqeta, and Qena Valley. It will also develop resorts and tourist villages between the Safaga and Al-Quseir areas.
New urban communities like New Qena will be built, alongside a number of new cities on the Qaft-Al Quseir Road floodplain, with Safaga and Al-Quseir further developed. Industrial projects set for implementation will develop the industrial zones in the governorates of Qena, Sohag, and Red Sea as well.
The Safaga-Qena railway extends 223 km in length, with 150km to be reconstructed. The plan is to run six trains per day on the railway line.
One train has 35 train carriages, each containing 65 tonnes of cargo, while the transport capacity for one line is 7,000 tonnes per day. It can be used to transport materials from production areas in the valley to manufacturing areas, or to transport coal from ports to manufacturing zones.
For marine ports, several platforms will be built in Safaga Port for containers, public goods, or dry moulding, 5km alongside the coast, with a total capacity of 30m tonnes.
Studies are also being conducted to develop Abu-Tartor Mining Port to raise its capacity from 2.5m tonnes of dry moulding to 6.5m, 2m tonnes of phosphoric acid. The developments will also see the port’s capacity rise to 1m tonnes of sulphuric acid, and 3m tonnes of public goods. It will cost an estimated $135m over three years, allocated to complete bidding procedures and implementation.
A total of 300,000 direct job opportunities will be provided during the 20 years of construction the project in the industrial sectors, in addition to 180,000 indirect opportunities, with a total of 480,000 job opportunities as a result of Golden Triangle Project.
