Egypt’s Minister of International Cooperation Rania Al-Mashat and US Ambassador to Cairo Jonathan R. Cohen visited, on Tuesday, Cairo’s main water treatment plant in Rod El-Farag neighbourhood, which was funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID). The visit aims to assess the socio-economic impacts of the project.
Leslie Reed, the Mission Director of the USAID, and Mamdouh Raslan, Chairperson of the Holding Company for Water and Wastewater (HCWW), were also present during the visit.
Al Mashat noted that this project comes under the Ministry’s Global Partnerships Narrative: people at the core, projects in action and purpose as the driver, which aims to transparently showcase projects and their impact on people to promote further action on the SDGs and bolster credibility.
“Our cooperation focuses primarily on enhancing the livelihoods of Egyptian people; and engages mostly with civil society organisations and the private sector. Thus, it is focused on putting people and inclusive partnerships at the core for a sustainable future,” Minister Al-Mashat stated.
For his part, Ambassador Cohen, said, “This facility and many more like it across Egypt represent the United States’ commitment to bringing clean water and sanitation services to the Egyptian people. Since 1986, the US has invested $243m to expand the Central Cairo Water System, which serves 5 million people. We have invested more than $3.5bn to help bring clean water and sanitation services to over 25 million Egyptians.”
As the world enters a decade of action and delivery until 2030, the Ministry of International Cooperation conducted a comprehensive mapping exercise of all current effective projects to identify their alignment with relevant SDGs.
In cooperation with several development partners, the Ministry of International Cooperation is currently implementing 43 projects worth $5bn for clean water and sanitation services.
The Ministry is also committed to expand cooperation programmes with the USAID. This year, the Ministry allocated an additional budget of around $112m to execute more projects in seven priority sectors contributing directly to the lives of the Egyptian citizens; namely health, education, higher education, science & technology, agriculture, governance, and trade.
The volume of strategic relationship between Egypt and USAID dates back to 1978, and is estimated at more than $30bn in various sectors that reflect Egypt’s development priorities, including health, population, education, and employment.
