2 500kV, Interconnection of Helwan South Power Plant - Abbreviated Resettlement Action Plan (ARAP)
Arab Republic of Egypt Ministry of Electricity & Renewable Energy Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company
500kV, Electrical Interconnection between Zahraa El Maadi Substation and Helwan South Power Plant
Retroactive Review For Already Constructed Towers And Abbreviated Resettlement Action Plan (ARAP) For One Tower
JULY, 2018
Prepared by:
Mohsen E. El-Banna Independent Consultant
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500 kV, Electrical Interconnection between Zahraa El Maadi Substation and Helwan South Power Plant Retroactive Review & Abbreviated Resettlement Action Plan TABLE OF CONTENTS No. Item Page List of Acronyms and Abbreviation 4 1. Introduction 5 2. Project Description 5 2.1. Components Funded through WB (P100047 - Sokhna Savings) 5 2.2. Overview 6 2.3. Current Implementation and Compensation Status 6 Part One: Retroactive Review of Compensation Status of 7 Towers Completed 7 3. Review Background 7 3.1 Land Type and Use 7 3.2 Potential Impacts on the Use of Land 7 3.3 Type of Settlement and Compensation 8 Part Two: Compensation Plan for the One Remaining Tower 9 4. Action Plan and Entitlement Matrix for the One Remaining Tower 9 5. Grievance Redress and Consultation 9 Annex 1: List of Affected Persons 10 Annex 2: Minutes of Land Transfer to an Association Member & Translation 11 Annex 3: Land Type and Use 13 Annex 4: Minutes of Assessment and Valuation 14 Annex 5: Documents Related to Remaining Tower & Actions Taken with Landowner 22 Annex 6: GRM Leaflet 29
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LIST OF ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATION
ARAP Abbreviated Resettlement Action Plan EETC Egyptian Electricity Transmission Company NGO Non-Governmental Organization OHTL Overhead Transmission Line PAP Project Affected Persons WB World Bank
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1. Introduction:
This document is a combined Abbreviated Resettlement Action Plan (ARAP) for one tower and a Retroactive Review for seven towers for the 500-kV overhead transmission line (OHTL) connecting between Zahraa El Maadi substation and Helwan South power plant.
Due to savings from the Ain Sokhna Power Project (P100047), the project’s restructuring allocated funding for the construction of the OHTL connecting Zahraa El Maadi substation and Helwan South power plant. This 500kV electrical interconnection is an integral part of the Egyptian Electricity Sector's on-going program to enhance transmission capacity for meeting the ever-increasing demand for electricity generation.
2. Project Description: 2.1. Components Funded through WB (P100047 – Ain Sokhna Savings)
A 2x750 MVA, 500/220 kV Zahraa El-Maadi Substation;
Two 165 MVAR, 500kV switchable line shunt reactors each to be installed at Assuit and Helwan South substations;
A 100 km, 500 kV double circuit OHTL connecting Zahraa El-Maadi substation and Helwan South power plant;
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2.2. Overview:
Construction of the Zahraa El-Maadi substation and two reactors does not involve any land acquisition as they are on vacant state-owned land and within the existing power plant respectively.
Majority section of 100 km of 500 kV double circuit OHTL Zahraa El- Maadi/Helwan South (with 212 towers in total) passes through state owned desert land. Only 12 towers are built on private land, of which: 4 towers fall within land designated to the Friends of the Earth Association for Agricultural Development of Al-Azhar University. The legal transfer of ownership from the Ministry of Agriculture to the Association is still not finalized, however the land is currently under the direction of the Association. 8 towers fall within private land owned by 6 owners (Please see Annex 1 for the list of owners). In fact, the land was transferred by the Association to these individuals in 2010 for reclamation purposes (Please see Annex 2 for Minutes of Land Transfer). The World Banks’s OP 4.12 on Involuntary Resettlement has been triggered and a Resettlement Policy Framework (RPF) was prepared in 2012 to establish resettlement objectives, organizational arrangements and funding mechanisms for any resettlement activities that may be necessary during project implementation. 2.3. Current Implementation and Compensation Status:
The construction of 2x750 MVA, 500/220 kV Zahraa El-Maadi Substation and two 165 MVAR, 500kV line shunt reactors is still on going. The civil work has been completed about 75%.
For 100 km of 500 KV OHTL, 205 out of 212 towers have been erected. The wire stringing has been completed for 35km.
EETC is the entity responsible for land acquisition and compensation. A committee formed from EETC staff (electricity systems engineers, measurements’ engineers and lawyers) are responsible for identifying plots of lands needed for the construction of towers and the ROW. The Zone Officer is the focal point between EETC and the project affected persons (PAPs), coordinating the access to the towers site with the PAPs, discussing compensations and receiving any complaints. The Zone Officer also coordinates with the Agricultural Directorate to receive an estimate of the compensation needed for crop damages. EETC is responsible for paying the compensation.
The crop compensation assessment was done by the Agricultural Directorate of Atfih for 5 of the affected land owners. Two land owners have already received their compensation as one payment, the others were informed to go to EETC to receive their bank checks with the compensation.
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Part One: Retroactive Review of Compensation Status of 7 Towers Completed
3. Review Background Since the erection of 7 towers has been completed without the preparation of the ARAP in accordance with the RPF, this section summarizes the impacts and compensation status to the landowners of these 7 towers.
In the preparation phase of the project, a survey of the project affected persons, local community representatives and NGOs showed that the route of the OHTL passed through state-owned desert lands with 12 towers falling on land allocated for agricultural reclamation. This agricultural reclamation land was allocated to the Friends of the Earth Association for Agricultural Development of Al-Azhar University for their members. Of the 12 towers, 4 are under the direction of the Association and no reclamation works have started on this land, and 8 towers are on land that is privately owned by 6 landowners. These 6 landowners are either members of the Association (4 landowners) or have bought the land from members of the Association (2 landowners). With the transfer of ownership from the Association to the individuals occurring in 2010 (Annex 2). The landowners are not dependent on agriculture as their main source of livelihood, but rather view these lands as additional investments whether in terms of agricultural cultivation later or sold in the future after increasing land values in this region.
3.1. Land Type and Use The land owned by these 6 owners is currently desert land with potential to be reclaimed for agricultural purposes. As mentioned in section 2.2, the land was allocated to the individuals in 2010 for reclamation purposes. However, there has been very limited reclamation activities since the land was transferred. It is still in desert condition without any crops cultivated on the land. Even when the land is reclaimed, there are limitations to the land use (please see Annex 3 for Land Type and Use).
For the land designated to the Association, it is still desert land without any current plans for reclamation.
3.2. Potential Impacts on the Use of Land After the towers are erected, the land remains owned by the Association and the private owners. EETC will not take over the ownership of the land. The private owners can continue to reclaim the land for cultivation purposes and the towers will not affect the potential use of the land for these purposes (Annex 3). The main impact incurred by the landowners is the inconvenience of having to delay reclamation activities during the construction period of the towers as well as the inconvenience of having the towers on the land for future reclamation and cultivation activities. However, since the land owners consider this land as a long-term investment, this impact is quite minimal. In addition, all of them currently live in the Greater Cairo area and none of the landowners currently rely on this land for their income and livelihood. Thus, the impacts on landowners and the Association are very limited.
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3.3. Type of Settlement and Compensation: - Type of Settlement For the 8 towers on the private land owned by six landowners: Since very few reclamation activities have started on the land, the construction does not cause any damages to crops and trees. For the impacts on the inconvenience for the future reclamation and cultivation, EETC offered the landowners a compensation package. Considering there are no other reclamation lands in the project area and no production on the land, five owners agreed to use the production value of potential crops as reference. The size of the footage of one tower is about 400 square meters. It was agreed that the compensation of the impacts will be based on the production value of one acre of land, i.e. 10 times of the actual size of the land occupied by the tower, since the land is still owned by the owners and can still be reclaimed and cultivated. Once the agreement was reached, EETC asked the Agricultural Directorate of Atfih to assess the price and kind of crops likely to be cultivated on an area of one acre. The Agriculture Directorate made the estimation by selecting the most valuable crop, which is wheat. The estimation of the production value is 480 EGP/carat, making the total compensation for the one acre of 11,520 EGP (please see Annex 4 for the minutes of assessment and valuation of each case individually in Arabic and one English translation as a sample). In case of any damages to crops done during the stringing of the towers, it will be assessed by the Agricultural Directorate of Atfih after stringing is done and crop compensation will be paid based on the assessment of the damages and in a timely manner (within 3 months of stringing). However, this will be unlikely as the land has not been cultivated.
For the 4 towers on the land designated to the Association: The land has been designated to the Association from the Ministry of Agriculture however, the legal transfer of ownership from the Ministry of Agriculture to the Association has yet to be finalized. Legally, these 4 towerrs currently fall on government-owned land (Ministry of Agriculture land) and thus no compensation is owed.
- Compensation Payment Status Compensation payment agreement has been signed with five landowners and compensation has been paid to two owners. Checks have been issued to the remaining three land owners but the checks have yet to be collected by the owners. Compensation agreement was not reach with one landowner. For this case, it will be covered in the follow sections as a Plan.
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Part Two: Compensation Plan for the One Remaining Tower
4. Action Plan and Entitlement Matrix for the One Remaining Tower
One landowner does not agree with the compensation package. One tower is on the land owned by this person. The tower has not been erected.
After the owner rejected the compensation package, EETC contacted local officials in Atfih and arranged a meeting with the owner, Mr. Ashraf Abdel Amin, with the attendance of a representative from the local community. However, the owner was not convinced to accept the compensation package as agreed to by the other owners. (Annex 5 includes documentation on this case).
To proceed with the construction of the remaining tower, EETC is in the process of requesting a Ministerial decree for the right of way. The Decree for the right of way will cover the following: EETC can have access to the land for construction of the tower but the land is still owned by the owner EETC should pay the compensation for access to the land based on the compensation determined by Agriculture Directorate If the owner does not agree with the compensation value, the owner can either send complaints by following the Grievance Redress Mechanism or appeal to the courts. Once the owner appeals to the court, EETC can start the construction after depositing the compensation value plus 10% to an escrow account under the name of the owner. Once the decision is made by the court, EETC will pay the amount to the owner based on the decision of the court.
Table 1: Entitlement Matrix for Remaining One Tower
Impacts Entitled persons Entitlement Inconvenience for access to Landowner Ten times of the annual the land under the tower for production value of a typical reclamation and cultivation crop (wheat in this case)
5. Grievance Redress and Consultation
A Grievance Redress Mechanism has been established to allow the affected persons to send, follow-up and reach satisfactory solutions for their complaints. The GRM system and leaflet distributed to the affected persons can be found in Annex 6.
As described in the document, the affected landowners are fully involved, engaged and participated in the process. All their views and concerns are taken into consideration.
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ANNEX 1: List of Affected Persons
Tower Place of NAME AGE Field of work/ job No. Residence Gender
El-Azhar University Hassan El-Araby M 56 6/5 Cairo
Nasr City, Financial Consultant, Emad Aboel-Hamd El-Saman M 45 7/5 Cairo Egyptian Cabinet
El-Azhar University Osama Mansour M 51 8/5 Cairo
El-Qubba, Owner & Manager, Said kamal Hassan Mostafa M 53 9/5 Cairo Samatel Aluminum Co.
Engineer, Ashraf Eid Amin M 45 10/5 Cairo El-Azhar University
Tokh, Driver, Islam Mahmoud Zidan M 49 11/5 Qalyobia El-Azhar University
In addition to the lands still owned by the Friends of the Earth Association for Agricultural Development of Al-Azhar University, which are still not allocated to individual members.
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ANNEX 2: Minutes of Land Transfer to an Association Member + Translation
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English Translation:
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ANNEX 3: Land Type and Use The geological characteristics of the soil in this region are characterized by two important factors that determine the type of crops that will be produced in the short and long terms: 1. Unstable sand surface soil. 2. The nature of the land in this area between Nile Valley (west) and Red Sea (east), is a hard rocky nature as part of the Red Sea Range. 1st Factor: In this type of desert land, the percentage of Organic compounds in the soil is very low or non-existent mainly, and this is a natural result of the scarcity of organic sources, which include the remains of desert plants, in addition to extreme climatic conditions in terms of high temperature, The rapid decomposition of plant residues and organic compounds without proper utilization. Therefore, if it is wanted to reclaim such desert lands, you should increase the percentage of organic matter in the soil to increase the fertility of the soil and thus reach an appropriate degree making it productive for agriculture. The percentage of organic matter in sandy soils is increased in several ways, - Cultivation of alfalfa plant, which is a renewable source of organic matter in the soil. - Cultivation of plants with short agricultural cycle (annual plants), which is a good source of organic compounds. - Planting natural plants in the soil and exploiting them as natural fertilizers. - The use of animal waste of all kinds in soil fertilization to increase their fertility This scenario, which lasts for 3 to 5 years, not only increases the soil organic compounds but also increases the concentration of soil due to the mineral organic soil mix which makes the soil stable, suitable for cultivation and resistant to various climatic factors including wind and flood. 2nd Factor: According to agricultural experts consulted in this regard, this type of land is not appropriate for the cultivation of perennial trees, such as fruit trees, whereas these trees need to form a deep roots network, Accordingly, it can only cultivate either traditional crops, or small trees with have surface roots such as watermelon and pumpkin. Therefore, it is clear that these lands will not be used in the cultivation of tall trees In any case, sooner or later, therefore, there will be no limitation for the using of the land for the purposes for which it was allocated.
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ANNEX 4: Minutes of Assessment and Valuation
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Translated Sample
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Issued Checks
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ANNEX 5: Documents Related to Remaining Tower and Actions Taken with Landowner
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ANNEX 6: GRM Leaflet
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