477 Red Sea Land Plots Allocated to State's Future of Egypt Authority for EGP 2 Trillion in Investment

The state-owned Future of Egypt Authority (Mostaqbal Misr) is expanding into the Red Sea, with 477 plots of land allocated to the agency to be offered to investors in projects valued at EGP 2 trillion, according to Al-Manassa.

The outlet frames the allocation as an expansion of the authority's footprint into the Red Sea Governorate.

The report as carried does not say where the plots are, how large they are, which sectors they are earmarked for, on what timetable they would be offered, or how the two-trillion-pound investment figure was arrived at. Nor does it say whether any of the land lies on the tourist coast between El Gouna and Marsa Alam.

That matters, because the Red Sea Governorate is very large. It runs from north of El Gouna all the way to the Sudanese border, and a plot allocated in the far south has a different meaning for Hurghada residents than one behind Sahl Hasheesh.

Land allocation is normally where large coastal projects begin. Hurghada News has reported the governorate's EGP 14.8 billion plan for 223 projects, including more desalination capacity and social housing, and the president's order banning construction within 200 metres of Egypt's shoreline — a rule that constrains how any newly allocated coastal land can be built on.

For residents and for the people who work in tourism here, the questions that count are which land, for what, and when. So far the announcement is a very large number without a map.