How Egypt is tackling single-use plastic waste in buildup to COP27 summit 

Volunteers in Cairo collect plastic from the Nile as part of a cleanup campaign. (AFP)
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Updated 23 October 2022
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How Egypt is tackling single-use plastic waste in buildup to COP27 summit 

  • Millions of tons of plastic waste are thrown into the Nile River every year, destroying fishing communities
  • Egypt’s resort town of Sharm El-Sheikh will host the 27th UN Climate Change Conference in November

CAIRO: For millennia, the Nile River has nourished the great civilizations of Egypt with copious fresh water, rich deposits of silt, plentiful fish, and means of navigation and trade. However, nowadays, the river carries another far less appealing bounty – plastic waste.

According to the Egyptian Organisation for Human Rights, about 4.5 million tons of waste flow into the Nile annually.

The Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research also found that the Nile is one of 10 rivers contributing to 90 percent of plastic waste entering the world’s oceans. Another study carried out by Sky News in 2021 found that 75 percent of the Nile’s fish contain microplastics.

To highlight both the environmental harm and the sheer ugliness of the floating trash heap, environmentalists and volunteers recently joined forces to build a giant pyramid – modeled on those of the nearby Giza Plateau – made entirely out of discarded plastic.

Built to coincide with World Cleanup Day on Sept. 17, the pyramid is made from more than 7,500 kg of plastic derived from around 250,000 upcycled bottles gathered from the Nile by a team of 60 fishermen over a period of 45 days.




A pyramid of waste highlights the scale of the problem. (Supplied)

World Cleanup Day is a global movement that brings together millions of volunteers to remove trash and other mismanaged waste from the world’s beaches, rivers, forests, and streets.

Designed and built by the VeryNile eco-initiative, established five years ago, the pyramid consists of 170 blocks, each weighing roughly 45 kg.

By assembling these blocks into the shape and scale of a pyramid, organizers hoped to demonstrate the enormity of the plastic waste problem, encourage recycling and responsible waste management, and promote a reduction in single-use materials.

Furthermore, by imitating Egypt’s most recognizable monuments, organizers also hoped to show that the eyesore of plastic waste is a blight on the country’s beauty and heritage.

To mark World Cleanup Day, organizers held an event dubbed “Play by the World’s Largest Plastic Pyramid.” Volunteers, influencers, and celebrities participated in cleanup with kayaks, created art, and held recycling workshops using discarded single-use plastic bags.

The pyramid will eventually be disassembled and sent to a local factory, which uses plastic to make strings and covers for car seats.




World Cleanup Day is a global movement that brings together millions of volunteers to remove trash and other mismanaged waste from the world’s beaches, rivers, forests, and streets. (Supplied)

“We are aiming to reach and clean every single inch of the River Nile in Egypt of plastic waste, as it really harms marine life, and fishermen can hardly find fish sometimes,” Hanaa Farouk, project manager at Bassita, the Egyptian social enterprise behind VeryNile, told Arab News.

“Our success over the past years would not have been the same without collaborating with our great team of local fishermen and talented women.”

To this day, fishermen rely on the river for their livelihoods. However, plastic waste kills off the Nile’s once plentiful fish stocks. That is why VeryNile is working to restore the fishing industry by making 40 local fishermen their Nile ambassadors on Qursaya Island, Cairo.

Qursaya Island, in the heart of the Nile, is today home to several recycling workshops and a workspace for local women to produce crocheted accessories, hats, bags, laptop cases, and other products from recycled single-use plastic bags.

VeryNile offers these communities financial assistance, paying fishermen 10 EGP (around $0.50) for every plastic bottle they collect. The initiative also hires fishermen to sort and compact these bottles before they are sent to factories for recycling and repurposing.

VeryNile raises environmental awareness through its clean-up events, which occur at different spots along the riverbank, both inside and outside Cairo, bringing together volunteers from various companies, banks, and other entities.

THENUMBER

7,500 - Kilograms of plastic derived from 250,000 upcycled bottles gathered from the Nile.

These events are done with kayaks or a cleaning boat, which is the first in Africa and can collect 500 kg of solid waste per week.

The Middle East and North Africa region faces a plethora of challenges in confronting the buildup of plastic waste; according to the World Bank, over 570,000 tons of plastic are thrown into the Mediterranean Sea every year, wreaking havoc on industries that rely on the sea, from fishing to tourism.

Additionally, widespread consumerism in Gulf countries has led to large amounts of discarded single-use plastic, with five Gulf Cooperation Council countries (Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Qatar, and Kuwait) ranking in the top 10 per capita generation of solid waste. Saudi Arabia produces 15 million tons of waste annually - only five percent recycled.

Egypt is not the only country tackling the plastic waste problem. Lebanon, Morocco, Jordan, Oman, Bahrain, the UAE, and Tunisia have all implemented local and national laws limiting the importation and use of single-use plastic bags. Sharjah, Dubai, and Abu Dhabi have all implemented fees on plastic bags and committed to banning them by 2024.

Kuwait, Egypt, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia have drafted laws or made policy recommendations to ban single-use plastic bags or replace them with biodegradable ones.

In line with Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 reform strategy, the Kingdom plans to invest over $6 billion into recycling by 2035. Saudi civil society groups also encourage people to recycle; the Mawakeb Alajer group has established recycling facilities where people can drop off everything from used paper to unwanted furniture and clothing.

The Saudi Investment Recycling Company, founded in 2017 to develop recycling capabilities in the Kingdom, plans to meet the objectives of Vision 2030 by enabling the creation of a circular economy – that is, an economy in which raw materials and finished products are re-used, repaired, and recycled for as long as possible.




A picture taken on September 29, 2022 shows plastic and garbage floating on the bank of Nile River in Cairo. (AFP)

In March last year, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman announced the Green Saudi Initiative and the Green Middle East Initiative. Though they primarily focus on cutting carbon emissions, preserving and restoring natural habitats are high-priority goals.

The crown prince later announced the formation of a government body to oversee the violation of the Kingdom’s environmental regulations, vowing to hold polluters accountable.

Egypt is working on reducing plastic consumption in the upcoming years through a national strategy that aims to eliminate the negative impact of plastic on health, the environment, the economy, and society. The country aims to cut the consumption of plastic bags to 100 bags per person by 2025 and 50 bags per person by 2030.

The drive to ban single-use plastics often starts locally, as in Egypt’s Red Sea Governorate, which in June 2019 prohibited the single-use of plastic bags, plastic cutlery used in restaurants, coffee shops, supermarkets, groceries, butchers, fisheries, and pharmacies, and during safari and boat trips.

Following the steps of the Red Sea Governorate, South Sinai’s Dahab announced a ban on the use of plastic bags across the city in July 2021.




Women recycle singleuse plastics into fashion items and other products as part of a VeryNile eco-initiative. (Supplied)

VeryNile’s pyramid project comes just ahead of COP27, the UN Climate Change Conference, which will be held in Egypt’s Sharm El-Sheikh during the second week of November.

At COP26 in Glasgow last year, hundreds of countries pledged to support energy transitions and climate change mitigation in the world’s poorest countries – those which contribute very little to carbon emissions and pollution but are the most affected by climate change.

In May, Egyptian special representative to the COP27 president Wael Aboulmagd said that helping developing countries adapt to climate change would be a priority in the upcoming conference, despite wealthy nations saying they would not deliver the $100 billion per year promised for stated goals.

At the end of September, Egypt called on all nations participating in COP27 to put aside political differences. Some countries staged a walkout in June to protest Russia’s presence at a UN climate meeting in Bonn.

Though 90 heads of state have confirmed attendance at the conference, the global economic strain brought on by coronavirus recovery efforts and the conflict in Ukraine may put environmental concerns on the back burner.

 


Israel says it’s moving toward Lebanon ceasefire

Updated 25 November 2024
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Israel says it’s moving toward Lebanon ceasefire

  • Axios said Israel and Lebanon had agreed to the terms of a deal
  • Israel’s security cabinet was expected to approve deal on Tuesday

JERUSALEM/BEIRUT: Israel is moving toward a ceasefire in the war with Hezbollah but there are still issues to address, its government said on Monday, while two senior Lebanese officials voiced guarded optimism of a deal soon even as Israeli strikes pounded Lebanon.
Axios, citing an unnamed senior US official, said Israel and Lebanon had agreed to the terms of a deal, and that Israel’s security cabinet was expected to approve the deal on Tuesday.
Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, said of a ceasefire: “We haven’t finalized it yet, but we are moving forward.” Asked for comment, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said it had nothing to say about the report.
Hostilities have intensified in parallel with the diplomatic flurry: Over the weekend, Israel carried out powerful airstrikes, one of which killed at least 29 people in central Beirut — while the Iran-backed Hezbollah unleashed one of its biggest rocket salvoes yet on Sunday, firing 250 missiles.
In Beirut, Israeli airstrikes levelled more of the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs on Monday, sending clouds of debris billowing over the Lebanese capital.
Efforts to clinch a truce appeared to advance last week when US mediator Amos Hochstein declared significant progress after talks in Beirut before holding meetings in Israel and then returning to Washington.
“We are moving in the direction toward a deal, but there are still some issues to address,” Israeli government spokesperson David Mencer said, without elaborating.
Michael Herzog, the Israeli ambassador in Washington, told Israel’s GLZ radio an agreement was close and “it could happen within days ... We just need to close the last corners,” according to a post on X by GLZ senior anchorman Efi Triger.
In Beirut, Deputy Parliament Speaker Elias Bou Saab said a decisive moment was approaching and expressed cautious optimism. “The balance is slightly tilted toward there being (an agreement), but by a very small degree, because a person like Netanyahu cannot be trusted,” he said in a news conference.
A second senior Lebanese official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Beirut had not received any new Israeli demands from US mediators, who were describing the atmosphere as positive and saying “things are in progress.”
The official told Reuters a ceasefire could be clinched this week.
The conflict between Israel and Hezbollah spiralled into full-scale war in September when Israel went on the offensive, pounding wide areas of Lebanon with airstrikes and sending troops into the south.
Israel has dealt major blows to Hezbollah, killing its leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and other top commanders and inflicting massive destruction in areas of Lebanon where the group holds sway.
Diplomacy has focused on restoring a ceasefire based on UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended a 2006 Hezbollah-Israel war. It requires Hezbollah to pull its fighters back around 30 km (19 miles) from the Israeli border.

ENFORCEMENT
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said the test for any agreement would be in the enforcement of two main points.
“The first is preventing Hezbollah from moving southward beyond the Litani (River), and the second, preventing Hezbollah from rebuilding its force and rearming in all of Lebanon,” Saar said in broadcast remarks to the Israeli parliament.
Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said Israel must press on with the war until “absolute victory.” Addressing Netanyahu on X, he said “it is not too late to stop this agreement!“
But Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter said Israel should reach an agreement in Lebanon. “If we say ‘no’ to Hezbollah being south of the Litani, we mean it,” he told journalists.
Hezbollah leader Sheikh Naim Qassem said last week that the group had reviewed and given feedback on the US ceasefire proposal, and any truce was now in Israel’s hands.
Branded a terrorist group by the United States, the heavily armed, Shiite Muslim Hezbollah has endorsed Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri of the Shiite Amal movement to negotiate.
Israel says its aim is to secure the return home of tens of thousands of people evacuated from its north due to rocket attacks by Hezbollah, which opened fire in support of Hamas at the start of the Gaza war in October 2023.
Israel’s offensive has forced more than 1 million people from their homes in Lebanon.
Diplomacy has focused on restoring a ceasefire based on UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended a 2006 Hezbollah-Israel war. It requires Hezbollah to pull its fighters back around 30 km (19 miles) from the Israeli border, and the regular Lebanese army to deploy into the frontier region.

 

 


Egypt says 17 missing after Red Sea tourist boat capsizes

Updated 25 November 2024
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Egypt says 17 missing after Red Sea tourist boat capsizes

  • Governor Amr Hanafi said that some survivors were rescued by an aircraft, while others were transported to safety aboard a warship

CAIRO: Egyptian authorities said 17 people including British nationals and other foreigners were missing after a tourist yacht capsized off the country’s Red Sea coast on Monday, with 28 others rescued.
The vessel, which was carrying 31 tourists of various nationalities and a 14-member crew, sent out a distress call at 5:30 am (0330 GMT), said a statement from Egypt’s Red Sea governorate.
An AFP tally confirmed that tourists involved in the incident include nationals from the UK, China, Finland, Poland and Spain.
The “Sea Story” embarked on Sunday on a multi-day diving trip from Port Ghalib near Marsa Alam in the southeast, and had been due to dock on Friday at the town of Hurghada, 200 kilometers (124 miles) north.
Governor Amr Hanafi said that some survivors were rescued by an aircraft, while others were transported to safety aboard a warship.
“Intensive search operations are underway in coordination with the navy and the armed forces,” Hanafi added in a statement.
Authorities have not confirmed the nationalities of the tourists.
Beijing’s embassy in Egypt said two of its nationals were “in good health” after being “rescued in the cruise ship sinking accident in the Red Sea,” Chinese state media reported.
The Finnish foreign ministry confirmed to AFP that one of its nationals is missing.
Polish foreign ministry spokesman Pawel Wronski said authorities “have information that two of the tourists may have had Polish citizenship.”
“That’s all we know about them. That’s all we can say for now,” he told national news agency PAP.The Red Sea governor’s office did not immediately respond to AFP’s request for comment about the possible cause of the accident.
According to a manager of a diving resort close to the rescue operation, one surviving crew member said they were “hit by a wave in the middle of the night, throwing the vessel on its side.”
Authorities in the Red Sea capital of Hurghada on Sunday shut down marine activities and the city’s port due to “bad weather conditions.”
But winds around Marsa Alam had remained favorable until Sunday night, the diving manager told AFP, before calming again by morning.
By Monday afternoon, it became increasingly “unlikely that the 17 missing would be rescued after 12 hours in the water,” he said, requesting anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
The Marsa Alam area saw at least two similar boat accidents earlier this year but there were no fatalities.
The Red Sea coast is a major tourist destination in Egypt, a country of 105 million that is in the grip of a serious economic crisis. Nationally, the tourism sector employs two million people and generates more than 10 percent of GDP.
Dozens of dive boats criss-cross between coral reefs and islands off Egypt’s eastern coast every day, where safety regulations are robust but unevenly enforced.
Earlier this month, 30 people were rescued from a sinking dive boat near the Red Sea’s Daedalus reef.
In June, two dozen French tourists were evacuated safely before their boat sank in a similar accident.
Last year, three British tourists died when a fire broke out on their yacht, engulfing it in flames.


Israel says it’s moving toward Lebanon ceasefire

Updated 59 min 11 sec ago
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Israel says it’s moving toward Lebanon ceasefire

  • Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, said of a ceasefire: “We haven’t finalized it yet, but we are moving forward”

JERUSALEM/BEIRUT: Israel is moving toward a ceasefire in the war with Hezbollah but there are still issues to address, its government said on Monday, while two senior Lebanese officials voiced guarded optimism of a deal soon even as Israeli strikes pounded Lebanon.
Axios, citing an unnamed senior US official, said Israel and Lebanon had agreed to the terms of a deal, and that Israel’s security cabinet was expected to approve the deal on Tuesday.
Israel’s ambassador to the United Nations, Danny Danon, said of a ceasefire: “We haven’t finalized it yet, but we are moving forward.” Asked for comment, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s office said it had nothing to say about the report.
Hostilities have intensified in parallel with the diplomatic flurry: Over the weekend, Israel carried out powerful airstrikes, one of which killed at least 29 people in central Beirut — while the Iran-backed Hezbollah unleashed one of its biggest rocket salvoes yet on Sunday, firing 250 missiles.
In Beirut, Israeli airstrikes levelled more of the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs on Monday, sending clouds of debris billowing over the Lebanese capital.
Efforts to clinch a truce appeared to advance last week when US mediator Amos Hochstein declared significant progress after talks in Beirut before holding meetings in Israel and then returning to Washington.
“We are moving in the direction toward a deal, but there are still some issues to address,” Israeli government spokesperson David Mencer said, without elaborating.
Michael Herzog, the Israeli ambassador in Washington, told Israel’s GLZ radio an agreement was close and “it could happen within days ... We just need to close the last corners,” according to a post on X by GLZ senior anchorman Efi Triger.
In Beirut, Deputy Parliament Speaker Elias Bou Saab said a decisive moment was approaching and expressed cautious optimism. “The balance is slightly tilted toward there being (an agreement), but by a very small degree, because a person like Netanyahu cannot be trusted,” he said in a news conference.
A second senior Lebanese official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said Beirut had not received any new Israeli demands from US mediators, who were describing the atmosphere as positive and saying “things are in progress.”
The official told Reuters a ceasefire could be clinched this week.
The conflict between Israel and Hezbollah spiralled into full-scale war in September when Israel went on the offensive, pounding wide areas of Lebanon with airstrikes and sending troops into the south.
Israel has dealt major blows to Hezbollah, killing its leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and other top commanders and inflicting massive destruction in areas of Lebanon where the group holds sway.
Diplomacy has focused on restoring a ceasefire based on UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended a 2006 Hezbollah-Israel war. It requires Hezbollah to pull its fighters back around 30 km (19 miles) from the Israeli border.

ENFORCEMENT
Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar said the test for any agreement would be in the enforcement of two main points.
“The first is preventing Hezbollah from moving southward beyond the Litani (River), and the second, preventing Hezbollah from rebuilding its force and rearming in all of Lebanon,” Saar said in broadcast remarks to the Israeli parliament.
Far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir said Israel must press on with the war until “absolute victory.” Addressing Netanyahu on X, he said “it is not too late to stop this agreement!“
But Agriculture Minister Avi Dichter said Israel should reach an agreement in Lebanon. “If we say ‘no’ to Hezbollah being south of the Litani, we mean it,” he told journalists.
Hezbollah leader Sheikh Naim Qassem said last week that the group had reviewed and given feedback on the US ceasefire proposal, and any truce was now in Israel’s hands.
Branded a terrorist group by the United States, the heavily armed, Shiite Muslim Hezbollah has endorsed Parliament Speaker Nabih Berri of the Shiite Amal movement to negotiate.
Israel says its aim is to secure the return home of tens of thousands of people evacuated from its north due to rocket attacks by Hezbollah, which opened fire in support of Hamas at the start of the Gaza war in October 2023.
Israel’s offensive has forced more than 1 million people from their homes in Lebanon.
Diplomacy has focused on restoring a ceasefire based on UN Security Council Resolution 1701, which ended a 2006 Hezbollah-Israel war. It requires Hezbollah to pull its fighters back around 30 km (19 miles) from the Israeli border, and the regular Lebanese army to deploy into the frontier region.


Arrest Warrant: UK would follow ‘due process’ if Netanyahu were to visit – foreign minister

Updated 25 November 2024
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Arrest Warrant: UK would follow ‘due process’ if Netanyahu were to visit – foreign minister

  • ICC issued arrest warrants on Thursday against Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu
  • Several EU states have said they will meet commitments under the statute if needed

FIUGGI: Britain would follow due process if Benjamin Netanyahu visited the UK, foreign minister David Lammy said on Monday, when asked if London would fulfil the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant against the Israeli prime minister.
“We are signatories to the Rome Statute, we have always been committed to our obligations under international law and international humanitarian law,” Lammy told reporters at a G7 meeting in Italy.
“Of course, if there were to be such a visit to the UK, there would be a court process and due process would be followed in relation to those issues.”
The ICC issued the warrants on Thursday against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, his former defense minister Yoav Gallant, and Hamas leader Ibrahim Al-Masri for alleged crimes against humanity.
Several EU states have said they will meet their commitments under the statute if needed, but Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has invited Netanyahu to visit his country, assuring him he would face no risks if he did so.
“The states that signed the Rome convention must implement the court’s decision. It’s not optional,” Josep Borrell, the EU’s top diplomat, said during a visit to Cyprus for a workshop of Israeli and Palestinian peace activists.
Those same obligations were also binding on countries aspiring to join the EU, he said.

 

 


Turkiye man kills seven before taking his own life

Updated 25 November 2024
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Turkiye man kills seven before taking his own life

Istanbul: A 33-year-old Turkish man shot dead seven people in Istanbul on Sunday, including his parents, his wife and his 10-year-old son, before taking his own life, the authorities reported on Monday.
The man, who was found dead in his car shortly after the shooting, is also accused of wounding two other family members, one of them seriously, the Istanbul governor’s office said in a statement.
The authorities, who had put the death toll at four on Sunday evening, announced on Monday the discovery near a lake on Istanbul’s European shore of the bodies of the killer’s wife and son, as well as the lifeless body of his mother-in-law.
According to the Small Arms Survey (SAS), a Swiss research program, over 13.2 million firearms are in circulation in Turkiye, most of them illegally, for a population of around 85 million.