3.17 Green Space in Cairo, the Arab Republic of Egypt

BOX 3.17

Green Space in Cairo, the Arab Republic of Egypt

There is increasing understanding of the role of green space and “green infrastructure” in mitigating urban heat island effects and in improving broader social well-being, health, and quality of life for residents as well as improving air quality. Cairo suffers from a shortage of green space, which has been exacerbated in recent decades by luxury developments and the enclosure of public spaces along the Nile. Three policy bodies and one executive-level government body guide green space provision: the Ministry for Planning and Administrative Reform, the Environmental Affairs Agency, the Organization for Urban Harmony, and the Cairo Cleaning and Beautification Agency.

Private sector organizations provide 67 percent of Cairo’s green space and charge entrance fees, membership fees, or both. These spaces are used by only 30 percent of the urban population and include gated compounds and sporting clubs, smaller green areas, and play spaces. The remaining 70 percent use public spaces that are, however, unevenly distributed. The distance to the nearest green space is on average 700 meters. The population groups with the worst access to green space (more than 1,350 meters away, on average, from even the smaller and “pocket” green spaces) are those in informal settlements. Surveys have shown that women feel safer in green spaces where they can be with other women and family members, even where these spaces are small. Surveys have also indicated the potential of religion in supporting broader green and sustainability awareness.

There is an argument for an integrated approach to green-space provision, adapted to local neighborhoods. This approach would involve public-private partnerships and effective community involvement and encompass smaller “pocket” areas and street greening, playgrounds, local sports facilities, and larger green spaces. There is scope also to convert wasteland, as illustrated by the Al-Azhar park in Eastern Cairo, a 30-hectare park created in 2005 with the assistance of the Aga-Khan Foundation and other donors. The foundation also helped restore historic monuments and supported development activities for neighboring communities.

There is scope for expanding initiatives that have been piloted, such as green roofs and vertical gardens, hillside greening on areas not suitable for construction, converting unused military and government land (nearly 840 hectares), “greening” the riverbanks and cemeteries (500 hectares), and greening unused industrial land and airport and railway premises. (The former Imbaba airport premises, for example, have been converted into a local park, overcoming arguments for developing the area for high-density housing.) Although both private and public green areas have a role in green infrastructure provision, the biggest challenge will remain the provision of accessible green space for Cairo’s poorest residents.

Source: Kafafy 2010.

The Al Shaheed Park in Kuwait is another prominent regional example where the main motivation was to protect the city from sandstorms and reduce air pollution. It is Kuwait’s largest park, with a green roof area of almost 20,000 square meters, and an artificial lake serves as a water reservoir during the hot season. It accommodates several amenities, and its continuous park character, preserved by equipping most buildings with an accessible green roof, give inhabitants a safe retreat from the hot climate (ZinCo GmbH 2020).

Roofs of buildings can also be used for energy production by installing solar panels, which support the overall change of the energy mix in the region’s cities as well as raising awareness for the possibilities of individual energy production in the population. Both local and federal governments could support such measures by granting subsidies for new buildings that include the integration of photovoltaic solutions in their design and construction. Furthermore, to incentivize the adoption of such solutions by companies but also private households, implementing efficient solutions for the feed-in of energy produced in this way in the general electricity system as well as establishing rates for feeding in energy are a necessary prerequisite to make such investments more attractive.

Another possibility for public entities in this regard could be to act as a role model by mandating a minimum number of solar panels or similar technologies on government buildings. In the United Arab Emirates, recent projects like ones by SirajPower32—consisting of installing solar panels covering a roof area of around 70,000 square meters on more than 100 buildings in the Jebel Ali Free Zone East and West—highlight the potential for such efforts. Displacing about 7,500 metric tons of CO2 per year, which corresponds to more than 125,000 trees being planted, this project has a capacity of 6.75 MW (Construction Week 2020). Expanding such efforts on a larger scale can effectively help spread the use of renewable energy sources apart from installing large solar or wind parks and can raise awareness of the general population by making the use of renewable sources more tangible.

Tables 3.6 and 3.7 summarize the plethora of options to tackle air pollution besides the emissions stemming from vehicles and industrial sources. Table 3.6 assesses some main aspects of the measures regarding their implementation, and table 3.7 provides closer descriptions of them.