"The offered lands are very fertile and Congo is a water-rich country and does not have an irrigation problem.”Ahmed Hamdy Bakr, deputy assistant foreign minister for central African affairs, said agricultural investment in Africa is a national security issue for Egypt.Experts, however, poured cold water on the initiative citing hot weather and lack of experienced farmers as the main obstacles to growing wheat in Congo.Nader Noureddine, a professor of water resources and land reclamation at Cairo University, said wheat cultivation is generally weak in the whole equatorial region, including the Congo Republic.Mohamed Nasr al-Din Allam, a former Egyptian irrigation minister, said the lack of experienced farmers might undermine endeavors to grow wheat in the Republic of Congo.“Egypt has carried out several projects to make use of every drop of water by building plants for water desalination and reuse of agricultural water in order to overcome the water crisis in Egypt.”"