Progress Of Egyptian Land Reform Project

Press, Volume XCIII, Issue 27875, 25 January 1956, Page 17

Progress Of Egyptian Land Reform Project

(From a Reuter Correspondent)

CAIRO. By the end of this year Republican Egypt hopes to have accomplished the first part of her radical land reform programme—confiscation of estates from the land barons and their distribution among the peasants. Sayed Marei, executive director of the agrarian reform committee, said recently that the amount of land due for requisitioning, 656,160 acres, will have been seized from the big landowners and turned over to the peasants by the end of 1956. About 180,000 acres have still to be requisitioned.

In 1953, the first year of the programme, 187,000 acres were requisitioned and distributed. By the end of 1954, 117,000 more had been turned over to the peasants. About 172,000 were dealt with in 1955, and the rest will be distributed this year. Land already seized includes most of former King Farouk’s rich cotton fields, sugarcane groves and orchards, and about two-thirds of the estates of the family of Prince Mohamed Ali, the former King’s uncle and one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in Egypt before the 1952 coup. The estates of the big owners have been broken up into plots of from two to five acres, and divided among the peasants and farmers of the locality. No person in Egypt will own more than 200 feddans (acres) of cultivated land by the end of 1956. That was the limit of private ownership set by the law, one of the first to be passed by the Republican regime. Repayment Spread

All land over 200 feddans was seized by the Government and the owners compensated in State bonds redeem-

able in 30 years, with an annual interest of three per cent. The value of the land was assessed at 70 times its basic annual taxes, which is also the price paid by the peasants, in instalments spread over 30 years. Up to July, 1952, 1758 Egyptians owned between them one-fifth of Egypt’s cultivated land,—about 1,082,000 acres. The Royal Family owned 196,000 acres. In Egypt, where 60 per cent, of the population are peasants, and where agriculture supplies 60 per cent, of the annual national income and 96 per cent, of the export trade, this tight, highly select group of big landowners wielded immense influence. They could, and usually did, force their armies of dependants to vote tor the political party which best served the interests of the landowning class.

The Land Reform Law, approved on September 9, 1952, did not aim solely at clipping the nails of the land barons. It envisaged extensive peasant training, land reclamation and a series of measures to increase and improve agricultural productivity. Training in modern farming methods has now been in progress for two years and is likely to go on for some time. Land reclamation projects are still in the blueprint stage, but the Government hopes to increase Egypt’s present 6,000,000 acres of cultivated land to 8,000,000 acres in the next 20 years. Land reclamation is essential if the nation’s agricultural output is to keep pace with the growing population. Egypt’s inhabitants in 1897 numbered 10,000,000. At the last census, in 1953. the total was 21,934,800.

The land reform programme also provided a substitute for the landowner, who used to supply his tenants with fertilisers, seeds, machinery, livestock and loans. That is now done by co-operatives formed in every agricultural village. These also give the farmers scientific guidance, provide social services, plan the cultivation and rotation of crops and market the principal crops for their members. The Government hoped that the cooperatives would foster a spirit of cooperation among the strongly individualistic peasants, but at first the peasants viewed them with suspicion. Gradually they are accepting them as an indispensable part of their work. They are also learning the benefits of team-work—especially after seeing that the output from land worked under the supervision of the co-operatives increased in 1953 and 1954 by approximately 30 per cent. Drift to Cities Apart from improving the living standards of Egypt’s peasants, the Government believes that better conditions on the fields and farms will solve the problem of the drift to the cities. After World War 11, an everincreasing number of peasants left the countryside for Cairo, Alexandria, Tantah, Mansurah, Port Said and Suez and the population of the towns began to overflow. Now the Government hopes, not only will the drift from the land stop but the flow will start in the reverse direction. Another of the problems tackled under the land reform programme has been housing. The first thing the peasants needed, both as a stimulant to harder work and a deterrent to moving to towns, was healthier home conditions, so the mud hovels of the peasant villages were condemed and are gradually being replaced by small, clean, brick and plaster cottages. The peasants help to build the houses and pay the cost, estimated at between £3OO and £4OO, in instalments over 20 years.

After thousands of years of feudalism, it was difficult to persuade the peasant that the land which he tilled was really his, that he need grovel before no one, and that he owed allegiance only to the Government of . coun t r y- Ministry of Agriculture officials lectured, talked and argued.

“But the peasant continues to have his doubts,” an official admitted recently. “Only when he saw the new look villages was he finally convinced that things were really changing for the better on his fields and farms, and that he was truly a free man at last.”