Egypt’s Ministry of Water Resources and Irrigation said on 2 October that Minister Hani Sewilam had received a report from Shore Protection Authority chairman Mohamed Ghattas on a feasibility study to protect coastal areas of the Nile Delta most exposed to risk, using environmentally friendly natural materials. The report covered field visits by authority officials accompanied by the international consultancy team responsible for the study. The five priority sites are west and east of the Rosetta Branch outlet, the Burullus area, east of the Damietta Branch outlet, and El-Deeba in Damietta and Port Said governorates. The ministry said these locations were selected from nine sites assessed against a set of criteria.

According to the ministry, the visits were intended to review existing technical, natural and environmental conditions and assess challenges and opportunities before identifying sustainable protection alternatives suited to each site. The announcement did not give a final engineering design, announce new construction or set a delivery date; it described a feasibility study and field assessment. Sewilam said the ministry wanted to draw on specialised international expertise, use current scientific approaches and develop sustainable, nature-based solutions for the Delta coast in response to climate change. He also described coastal protection projects as a practical climate-adaptation model aimed at protecting people and infrastructure and addressing shoreline erosion. The release supplied no cost estimate or site-specific hazard measurements for the five locations.

For wider background, the ministry’s project page describes cooperation with the United Nations Development Programme, implementation by the Egyptian General Authority for Shore Protection and funding from the Green Climate Fund for a programme covering the Nile Delta and North Coast. Its stated plan targets protection of 69 kilometres of coastline in five areas across Kafr El-Sheikh, Beheira, Port Said, Dakahlia and New Damietta, alongside integrated management planning for 1,200 kilometres of Mediterranean coast with a horizon to 2100. Those are programme figures and aims, not new outcomes reported from the 2 October visits. UNDP’s project description identifies soft-protection design and site assessments as part of the programme; the specific alternatives for each of the five locations in the feasibility study remain subject to the technical and environmental review described by the ministry. The development announced so far is therefore an assessment of options, rather than approval of one uniform solution or a statement that protection works at all five sites are complete.