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Egypt's Dilemna

 Egypt had had stable government for nearly 5,000 years.   Until modern communication, the country was completely isolated, with desert on either side and fertile land next to the Nile River.  Over thousands of years, irrigation expanded the possible population where nearly twenty million people could be fed from the land it cultivated.  

Until 1947, the population of Egypt was about twenty million, in 1962 the population of Egypt was still around 20 million.   Infant mortality and war ensured that over 15 years the population hardly grew.  Today Egypt's population stands at 111 million, the building of the Aswan dam allowed a massive increase in the land that was cultivated, and with the help of foreign-purchased fertilizer (100% imported), the country can meet about half its total caloric input.   

Egypt's problem for the past four years was the massive increase in the cost of fertilizer, a good portion of that increase was absorbed by the government, and still the cost of food has exploded.   The invasion of Ukraine by Russia had been terrible, because Egypt is one of the largest importers of grain from Ukraine, and the cost of fertilizers has only risen.   This has led the government, in an economic bind.   The deficit and the foreign debt rise are all coming home to roost at the same time.

Reasonably priced food is the one thing that has maintained social peace, the riots about a decade ago (the Arab Spring) were all about food prices, specifically the cost of Palm oil.  

40 years ago, immigration would have solved Egypt's problem.  Today, the birth rate is high, over 2.62, very much like the rest of Africa, where the average birth rate is over 3 (it's around 1.1 in China and Germany), this means that Africa has the fastest population growth and yet some of the poorest quality agricultural land.  the only excellent land is in southern Africa (Zimbabwe and South Africa) which have their own challenges.  

Egypt today is the poster child for what will happen in a good percentage of Africa (excluding oil-rich Nigeria).   Population growth, poor arable land and the rising cost of fertilizer and foodstuff will lead to riots and civil wars.  

The Western world doesn't care much about Africa, some do matter, but most of the continent is not very productive.   The continent's colonial past has some reason for today's outcome, but at one point the blame has to fall on the elected officials.   It also means that the US will stay away (The French finally left a year ago...)

The question then becomes why am I interested in Egypt?  The answer is that as a largely homogenous population (ethnic and religious) a conflict in Egypt will be the best guide to understand what will happen to the rest of the continent.   Geographically Egypt cannot expand, the security of deserts is also its limitation.  

A tragedy! 




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