The Economist February 26th 2022 Middle East & Africa 49Publictransport
Aban on the van
W
eavinginandoutoftraffic, the
minibuses on Cairo’s ring road seem
to be racing. In a sense, they are. The white
minivans compete to pick up passengers
and faster trips mean more fares. Since a
ride costs as little as five Egyptian pounds
($0.32), quantity is key. So drivers speed
along the motorway, exploiting every little
gap in the traffic. Some are intoxicated by
tramadol, an opioid that has a reputation
for improving alertness (and male sexual
stamina), two claims your correspondent
preferred not to test.
The privately run minibuses are a fix-
ture in the capital. But locals do not exactly
like them. Start with the erratic drivers,
who contribute to the city’s dreadful re-
cord on road safety. Traffic in Cairo, already
a nightmare, is made worse when they stop
to pick up and offload passengers. The
vans, which run on cheap diesel, belch
noxious fumes into the air. For the govern-
ment they are an embarrassment, a loud
reminder of its failure to provide adequate
public transport in greater Cairo, home to
about 20m people.
That helps explain why officials said
that minibuses would be banned from the
ring road by the end of last year. Taking
their place would be a new bus rapid tran-
sit (brt) system operating in dedicated
lanes. Green types are pleased (Egypt will
host the cop27 climate conference this
year). But don’t be fooled: the minibuses
will still be around for a while.
Fifty years ago Cairo had an enviable
network of trams and buses, which was
used by most residents. A metro system,
opened in 1987, was the first of its kind in
Africa. But the trams are all gone and even
officials are unsure how many buses re-
main in operation or where exactly they go.
The metro has a different problem. Though
it covers a limited area, it is often packed,
reportedly carrying the highest number of
passengers per kilometre of any metro in
the world. Rather than braving the crush,
Egyptians who can afford them buy cars in-
stead. Fuel is subsidised, which aggravates
both pollution and congestion.
Most other folk rely on the minibuses.
Poor planning and even poorer policies are
partly to blame. The government has built
satellite cities around the capital in an at-
tempt to alleviate overcrowding. Most of
these are connected to Cairo via the ring
road. But until recently there was little
public transport between them because
thegovernmentwantedCairenestomove
tothenewcities,notcommutetoorfrom
them.Theminibuses,whichconnectthe
varioussettlements,filledthevoid.(Simi-
larlybelchingtuk-tuks,whichthegovern-
ment sporadically threatens to curb,
squeezedownnarrowalleysandthrough
gapsinthetraffic.)
Analyststhinkthebrtwilleventually
offerreliefbutthatthebanonminibusesis
premature. Thefirst phaseofthebrt
wouldcovermuchlessgroundthanthe
minibuses,whichplytheringroadonma-
nyoftheirroutes.Analystsproposewait-
inguntilmoreofthenewpublic-transport
systemisinplace.Thatcouldtakeawhile.
Thefirstphaseofthebrtwassupposedto
openattheendoflastyear.Delaysincon-
structionhavepusheditback.Sothemini-
busesarestillflyingdowntheringroad.CAIRO
Rethinking transport in Egypt’s
congested capital
FalconryBeak demand
T
houghitseyesarecovered,thefalcon
looks frightened in the video. It sits fro-
zen on its perch as a dozen excited men bid
for the creature. The scene plays out in the
Libyan city of Tobruk. But the bidders,
phones in hand, are relaying prices to trad-
ers in the Gulf. When the offers top 1m di-
nars ($220,000) those in the room yell Al-
lahu akbar(God is great). Finally the bird is
sold to a man in a camouflage jacket for
2.25m dinars, making it one of the most ex-
pensive falcons in the world.
Falcons have long inspired passion
among Arabs. The Bedouin used them to
hunt and still recite poems extolling them.
Medieval caliphs led parties into the bush
to watch their falcons swoop down on
game. Today Gulf royals spare no expense
on such outings. With prey at home dwin-
dling, they have began hunting abroad, in
such countries as Mongolia, Morocco and
Pakistan. Some call it “falcon diplomacy”.
Lately a craze for falcon-racing and
beauty contests has increased demand for
the birds. Falcon clubs have opened across
the Arabian peninsula, some offering
courses to children as young as five. Air-
lines in the Middle East sell seats for the
birds. (A Saudi prince once filled most of a
commercial jet with his flock.) Falcon ow-
nership has tripled in the Gulf over the past
decade, says Karim Rousselon of the Inter-
national Association for Falconry. The fin-
est birds cost more per gram than gold.
But even at such heady prices, there are
not enough wild falcons to satisfy the de-mand. The saker falcon, as a favoured local
species in the Gulf is known, is already en-
dangered. In the Arabian peninsula wild
ones are all but extinct. Many countries
have banned trade in them. But buyers and
sellers have found ways around the rules.
In lawless Libya traders sometimes
stitch closed the eyelids of captured speci-
mens to keep them from flying away.
Poachers in Pakistan pin prey to sticks in
order to capture migrating falcons. Places
like Britain also contribute to the problem,
says Guy Shorrock of the Royal Society for
the Protection of Birds. Recent changes to
the law have made it harder to trace falcons
and their eggs leaving the country. “We’re
part of the global business to supply the
Arab demand for hunting and falcon rac-
ing,” says Mr Shorrock.
It is not just falcons that this situation
harms. The houbara bustard is big and fast,
but also rather dumb. Falcons love to hunt
it, leading to a mostly illegal trade in the
bustard that has put it on the road to ex-
tinction. To help it recover without curb-
ing hunting, the United Arab Emirates
(uae) has opened bustard-breeding farms
at home and abroad. One in Morocco,
where the uae’s crown prince, Muhammad
bin Zayed, likes to hunt, has bred almost
300,000 bustards since opening in 1995.
The uaehas also promoted the use of
farmed falcons, not least by banning im-
ports of all wild-caught birds. “A decade
ago 90% of the uae’s falcons were wild,”
claims Mr Rousselon. “Now 90% are cap-
tive-bred.” But other Gulf countries lag be-
hind the uaein terms of regulation. And
many falconers prefer wild birds to those
bred on a farm. In the uaethe ban has
caused prices to spike—but failed to stop
the trade in falcons. Senior officialsset a
bad examplebyobtaining waivers. Their
appetite for wildfalcons risks killing the
sport they love.The market for falcons is soaring as
wild populations declineAfair-feathered friend