Egypt's Dam Problem: The Geopolitics of the Nile
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This video was made possible by Skills hare. Get ahead at work or pick up a new passion while learning skills for free for two months by being one of the 1,000 to go the link in the description. This is the Nile River—perhaps the single most legendary waterway in the world. It originates somewhere roughly here, potentially in Uganda or Burundi, but its tributaries are so convoluted that no one knows for sure where its true source is. It starts in earnest, though, here, on the Ugandan side of Lake Victoria, and snakes northward through the rest of Uganda and South Sudan before entering Sudan and reaching its capital of Khartoum. This stretch from Lake Victoria to Khartoum is considered the White Nile and, in Khartoum, it connects with the Blue Nile to become the Nile proper.
This other tributary starts at Lake Tuna in Ethiopia and, while it’s the shorter and potentially less well known of the two, its actually far larger than the White Nile as it carries 85% of the water that flows through the Nile itself. Of course, 100% of this immense river ends up passing through Egypt. Now, while these may be their legal borders, for all intents and purposes, Egypt is not this, but this.
Some 95% of the country’s 98 million strong population lives within the narrow strip of land flanking the Nile River. Truly, Egypt is the Nile and the Nile is Egypt. Almost all of its power and influence, both modern and ancient, is linked to this waterway. Of course, much of what most people know this country for is its past, rather than its present, as for nearly three millennia, Ancient Egypt was one of the most powerful and advanced civilizations on earth. Of course one can’t link the success of any society to a single factor, but it’s undeniable that at the time of the height of Ancient Egypt’s reign, agricultural prowess was directly linked to societal advancement. You could only develop new technology if you could produce enough food to feed the thinkers, and Egypt could thanks to the Nile. Every year, in August and September, the river would flood over its banks and then, in October, it would recede, leaving the floodplains well watered and fertilized, and allowing for a very productive year of agriculture.
Upstream, while its stories might not be as frequently included in the high school history books, what is now Sudan benefited from a similar effect. The Kingdom of Kush, in particular, became an advanced society alongside the Nile, upstream from modern day Egypt, and still to this day, much of the country’s population is concentrated in a narrow green zone along the Nile. That’s mostly to say, Egypt and Sudan have benefited through history from this river in a largely similar way, but then there’s the outlier: Ethiopia.
Now, comparing the satellite images of Egypt and Sudan to that of Ethiopia, there’s a pretty clear difference—Ethiopia is green. Save for the coast, most of Egypt receives less than ten millimeters of rain per year, on average. This is also the case for much of Sudan, but then, in the south, the weather gets a little wetter, the land becomes a bit greener, and dependence on the Nile lowers. Of course, further upstream, in the Ethiopian.
Highlands, dependence on this river for water is nearly nonexistent. Certain areas receive close to 80 inches or 200 centimeters of rain per year, which, in comparison, is four times that of London. These immense rains, in fact, end up in the Nile itself, feeding most of its flow, and eventually reach Sudan, Egypt, and the Mediterranean Ocean.
At least that was the case until the early 1900s. At that time, colonial powers and industrialists sought not only to use the river, but to control and fundamentally reshape it. This began in 1902 with the opening of the Aswan Low Dam, then continued in the 1910s and 20s with the development of the single largest irrigation system in the world in Sudan, and as time went on, the flow of the Nile became less and less natural. With increasingly large dams and irrigation projects, it slowly became clear that this was all, more and more, a zero sum game. It became clear that the flow of the river was, indeed, finite.
Therefore, they needed treaties. In 1929, the British, representing Sudan and a few other upstream countries, reached an agreement with Egypt that, in exchange for a number of smaller concessions, gave the country unconditional veto power over upstream projects that it believed would reduce the amount of water to reach them. This was followed up in 1959 with another agreement that gave Egypt the rights to 66% of the river’s flow, Sudan 22%, and the rest was considered to be lost to evaporation. Through time, these and other agreements created a system where Egypt, with the help of Sudan, was, on paper, the master of the entire river, even beyond their borders, despite their geographic position at the very end of it. Except, the one country that was never party to any of these agreements was Ethiopia—where most of the water originates.
Still, Egypt has maintained that the Treaties of 1929 and 1959 are binding agreements, underscored by their historic use of the river, regardless of who was at the table or who represented the upstream states under colonial rule when they were signed. They believe that they have a say in water projects upstream, outside their borders, insofar as the river maintains the same rate of flow once it reaches Egypt. This remained a nominal issue for most of the twentieth century, but it all changed once Ethiopia had centralized enough power, political will, and money to start to reshape the Nile. It all comes down to development. You see, while Egypt’s historic development was thanks to the water of the Nile, it’s now proving to be a barrier. 97% of the country’s freshwater comes from this river and, while Egypt’s population has grown, the Nile has, effectively, shrunk. Therefore, annual water supply per capita in the country has halved since 1970, even as the country’s economy has further developed.
The UN considers any country with under 1,000 cubic meters of water per person per year as “water scarce.” Egypt has just 570. It is now, more than ever, held back by water—for example, it has to import around half of its food, at huge cost to both its people and the government, which subsidizes food. While the Nile may have been more than enough when Egypt’s population was two or three or four million, thousands of years ago, it now is far from that as they’re pushing up against a population of 100 million.
Ethiopia, meanwhile, does have significant issues with food security, but not exactly because they don’t have enough water. As most people there live from harvest to harvest, they’re prone to food shortages from a bad year. The semi-regular famines that ensue are dramatic, but the country has managed to develop despite them. Since 2004, Ethiopia’s GDP has grown about 10% per year, which is immense. In fact, between 2013 and 2018, it became the fastest growing economy in the world, which is especially impressive given its large size. Much of this growth has been fueled by one thing: infrastructure investment.
They’ve built a new railway to Djibouti, opened East Africa’s first light rail system in Addis Ababa, and are planning the construction of Africa’s largest airport, however, the story of Ethiopian infrastructure development is most defined by just one, single project: the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam.
Located in the north-west of the country, this dam, once completed, will house the 8th largest hydroelectric power facility in the world, it will be nearly three times larger than the next largest on the African continent, and the reservoir behind it will be able to hold more water than the entire Blue Nile itself. It will be able to produce, in a year, nearly 16,000 GWh of electricity. With that, it could fulfill the power needs of 234 million Ethiopians. While that would be noteworthy on its own, it’s even more so considering that the population of Ethiopia is only about 109 million. This project, in one fell swoop, will give the country a major power surplus.
That is exciting for Ethiopia for two reasons. First, it should have a multiplier effect for development. Not only does building and operating the dam itself provide jobs, but if this energy can make its way to rural areas especially, it could make certain jobs, such as farming, more productive. According to the Rocky Mountain Institute, there’s about $4 billion in potential economic opportunity just from electrifying small rural farms and making their processes more efficient, which is the equivalent of about 5% of the country’s GDP. Ethiopia has one of the lowest per capita power consumption rates in the world—the average American consumes as much power as 186 Ethiopians—and increasing that can and will improve quality of life and increase economic growth.
In addition to that, though, having more power than they need means that Ethiopia can become an energy exporter. The country plans to sell power to neighboring Sudan, which is also severely energy starved, and eventually Egypt, Djibouti, Uganda, and Tanzania too. All in all, according to the World Bank, Ethiopia could become the largest power exporter in Africa—earning around $1 billion a year. For Ethiopia and Ethiopians, this project is a physical manifestation of the country’s stunning, inspiring rise, and, uniquely, it’s truly their dam.
Unlike most large infrastructure project in the region, this one was largely self-funded by taxes and bonds that everyday Ethiopians bought. That means that a big chunk of Ethiopian people are financially and emotionally linked to it, and it’s one of the rare unifying causes in a country defined by ethnic violence and highly factional politics. To Ethiopians, the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam is a powerful force for good. Downstream, though, perceptions are very, very different. In Egypt, this new dam is viewed as an existential threat. It’s a single project that has the potential to upend their entire way of life.
Ethiopia will have the ability to quite literally flip a switch to control how much water gets to Egypt, and therefore how many people in the country are hungry or thirsty. While some are concerned that Ethiopia will actually do this and remove water from the river to use for agriculture, that’s not likely considering where the dam is—being so close to the border with Sudan, this would require them to pump water back upstream, which would be hugely expensive and impractical. The more real threat for Egypt is around what’s starting to happen now—the filling of the reservoir. You see, given that the reservoir behind the dam—required to keep the flow consistent even during drier seasons—can hold the contents of the entire Blue Nile itself, the process of filling it could have a significant impact on the flow rates of the river. While the long-term process of electricity generation won’t actually remove any water from the river, as one must run it through the turbines, the short-term process of filling the reservoir will likely lead to a period of a few years when, in Egypt, there’s less water for agriculture, drinking, and generating electricity.
The big question therefore is: how long will the filling of the reservoir take?
For Ethiopia, they want this to happen as fast as possible. The sooner the reservoir is filled, the sooner
they can put all their turbines online, and the sooner they’ll get a return on their investment. For Egypt, though, they don’t want this to happen at all, but if it does, they at least want it to be filled as slow as possible, ideally in periods of heavy rain when there’s a surplus of water. In their minds, it’s going to be easier to get through a decade or so with slightly lower flows than just two or three years with dramatically lower flows. Egypt is also worried about a foreign power having such an immense amount
of control over them—this potentially permanently gives Ethiopia the upper hand. If they don’t get what they want from Egypt, they can just turn off the tap.
Both Egypt and Ethiopia, meanwhile, seem to think that this issue is worth escalating tensions over, even though, to the external observer, it’s clear that there is a mutually beneficial solution. On the western side of the continent, a quite similar situation exists with the Senegal River. This waterway’s flow originates in the mountains of Guinea and, to a lesser extent, Mali—two fairly rainy countries—and snakes westward to form the border between Senegal and Mauritania—two rather dry countries. Recognizing that all four countries rely on this river, but for different reasons, they formed an organization, the Senegal River Basin Development Authority, to jointly manage the waterway for the mutual benefit of all. This organization has crafted multinational agreements to ensure that the downstream, drier countries have the water they need to ensure food security, while also ensuring that the upstream countries can benefit from cheap, clean power. They built a hydroelectric dam in Mali which shares its power jointly with Mauritania and Senegal, and then another dam near the coast to prevent saltwater from making its way upstream, and to irrigate farmland in Mauritania and Senegal. All in all, they treat the river as a multinational asset, they recognize the dependence of downstream populations on it, and they ensure that any development upstream is to the mutual benefit of all member states.
This can also be the case for the Nile. The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam can benefit Ethiopia, Sudan, and Egypt, such as through managing the flow to prevent floods, reduce the impact of droughts, and increase productivity of all countries’ dams, but only if they work together. The reality right now, though, is that Egypt, Ethiopia, and the other stakeholders are incredibly far from this goal. Egypt maintains a rhetoric that predicts, “inevitable conflict” if their demand are not met, while Ethiopia has reportedly been preparing for the prospect of this by installing anti-aircraft batteries around the dam. Egypt has long been the political master of the Nile, largely because it’s historically been the dominant economy along the Nile, and so it seemingly can’t accept a future where that is no longer the case.
Ethiopia has always been the natural, geographic master of the waterway, but it is only just now coming to realize that. Without experience in multinational cooperation over the river, it can’t seem to accept much less than full control. There are really only two futures with this river: either Ethiopia and Egypt come to cooperate, and then turn the Nile into an economic engine for the entire region, or they don’t, and fall further into a conflict which will hold them both back. This entire region could have a bright future, but to get on the path towards that, they need to focus on the Nile as a tool for unification, rather than division. They need to ignore the political relics of the region’s colonial past, and forge their own future based on the realities of today. Once they do so, the Nile could not only maintain its status as one of the most legendary waterways in the world, but it could regain its position as one of the most economically influential ones, just as it was many millennia ago.
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