Country agriculture profile · Middle East, North Africa, Afghanistan & Pakistan
Egypt, Arab Rep.
Egypt is an almost entirely arid country whose agriculture is confined to the irrigated Nile Valley and Delta and to reclaimed desert on their fringes, where the river’s water sustains some of the most intensive cropping systems in the world. Warm winters and abundant irrigation allow year-round production, rotating winter wheat, berseem clover, and sugar beet with summer rice, maize, and cotton, and — in Upper Egypt — sugarcane. Smallholdings integrate cattle and water buffalo for milk and draught with fodder crops, alongside a large poultry sector. Because rainfall is negligible almost everywhere, essentially all cropland depends on Nile irrigation, and the country is at once a major producer of rice, long-staple cotton, and horticulture and one of the world’s largest importers of wheat.
Farming systems (stable overview)
Climate zones
- Hot desert (arid)
- Mediterranean (narrow north coast)
Agroecological zones
- Nile Delta
- Nile Valley (Middle and Upper Egypt)
- Reclaimed desert fringe
- North-coast rainfed strip
Dominant crop systems
- Fully irrigated Nile Valley and Delta cropping with multiple crops per year
- Winter wheat, berseem clover, and sugar beet
- Summer rice, maize, and long-staple cotton
- Sugarcane in Upper Egypt
- Irrigated citrus and vegetable horticulture for export
Major livestock systems
- Smallholder cattle and water buffalo for milk and draught, integrated with fodder crops
- Sheep and goats
- Large-scale poultry
Irrigation: Essentially all cropland is irrigated from the Nile — historically by basin flooding and now perennially since the Aswan High Dam — so agriculture is almost wholly dependent on a single river system.
Latest verified data
Each value is the most recent available observation, shown with its own year and unit. Figures are periodically revised — treat them as dated, sourced statistics, not evergreen facts.
| Indicator | Value | Unit | Year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Agricultural land | 4.08 | % of land area | 2023 |
| Arable land per person | 0.03 | hectares per person | 2023 |
| Cereal yield | 7,402.2 | kg per hectare | 2023 |
| Agriculture value added | 13.71 | % of GDP | 2024 |
| Employment in agriculture(est.) | 17.98 | % of total employment | 2024 |
| Average precipitation | 18.1 | mm per year | 2022 |
| Rural population | 57.2 | % of total population | 2024 |
Source: World Bank Open Data (World Development Indicators) (opens in a new tab) · dataset version 2026-07-01 · retrieved 2026-07-12
Cereal yield over time
Show data table
| Year | kg per hectare |
|---|---|
| 2012 | 7,269 |
| 2013 | 7,285.3 |
| 2014 | 7,085 |
| 2015 | 7,117.3 |
| 2016 | 7,251.5 |
| 2017 | 7,400.6 |
| 2018 | 6,776 |
| 2019 | 6,043.8 |
| 2020 | 7,167.4 |
| 2021 | 7,340.5 |
| 2022 | 7,080.3 |
| 2023 | 7,402.2 |
Source: World Bank Open Data (World Development Indicators) (opens in a new tab) · dataset version 2026-07-01 · retrieved 2026-07-12
Derived indicator
Arable land as a share of agricultural land: 76.5 % of agricultural land (2023)
Derived value — formula arable-share-of-agricultural-land v1.0.0 (calc v1). Inputs: AG.LND.ARBL.ZS (3.1) ÷ AG.LND.AGRI.ZS (4.1). A derived ratio, not an observed statistic. Sensitive to rounding and to differing revision cycles of the two source series; omit rather than extrapolate when a common year is unavailable.
Documented crops & livestock
Agricultural institutions
- Agricultural Research Center (ARC) — National agricultural research body under the Ministry of Agriculture and Land Reclamation.
- Ministry of Agriculture and Land Reclamation — National ministry responsible for agriculture, irrigation-linked land reclamation, and food policy.
Data coverage & limitations
Covered by the World Bank WDI snapshots for land, production, yield, economy, inputs, and environment indicators, compiled largely from FAO and national sources.
- Agricultural statistics are dated, versioned, and periodically revised; always read them together with their observation year and dataset version.
- National statistical definitions — of agricultural land, irrigated area, holdings, and livestock categories — differ between countries and over time, which limits strict cross-country comparison.
- Because nearly all cropland is irrigated from the Nile, water availability rather than land is the binding constraint, and cropped area can exceed physical land area where multiple crops are grown in a year.
- Old-land Valley and Delta holdings and newer reclaimed-desert farms differ markedly in productivity, a contrast that national averages blend together.
Sources
This article draws on the following authoritative sources. See our sources & methodology for how they are selected.
- Authoritative
Cited for: Agricultural statistics (WDI)
- Type:
- Intergovernmental organization
- Jurisdiction:
- Global
- Accessed:
- 2026-07-12
- [2]FAO — Food and Agriculture Organization (opens in a new tab)Authoritative
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
Cited for: Production systems, irrigation, and food-balance context
- Type:
- Intergovernmental organization
- Jurisdiction:
- Global
- Accessed:
- 2026-07-12