The Suez Canal: The Past, Present and Future

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The Suez Canal was one of the first artificial canals built in the world used for trade and travel. This essay will show us about the history, the canal today and the future plans.

The construction of the canal dates back to 1854, when the Egyptian viceroy Said Pasha was persuaded by a French diplomat and an engineer, Ferdinand de Lesseps, to support the building of a canal. The idea was to build a canal through 100 miles of desert in Egypt connecting the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea. A Few years later, in 1858 a new company was formed known as the Universal Suez Ship Canal Company owned by both Egyptians and French. The company got the authority to start the construction in April, 1859 and finished on November 17th, 1869. However, the main reason for the creation of the canal was to shorten the trade routes, they took 10 years to finish the canal which cost 100$ million. Moreover, the unique geographical location of the canal makes it important to the world and to Egypt itself. Since it is considered as the shortest water way between the east and west which saves time and fuel usage so minimizing the cost of the journey. According to eoearth.org fifty vessels pass the canal each day which is 8% of the world’s shipping traffic. However, The Channel revenue declined by 7.4%, or $375.3 million during February, 2013, compared with $381.4 million a year earlier (ahram.org, 2013).

The idea of building a Canal dates back to ages before this century for different proposes. In the modern age, Napoleon Bonaparte was the first who made an effort to build the canal to destroy the English trading. In 1799, the project begun by Charles Le Pere but an arithmetical error showed that the Red Sea was ten meter higher than the Mediterranean...

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...tion in the world that’s changed the transportation, people lives as well as the Egypt economy.

Works Cited

Briney, A. (n.d.). Suez Canal Connects the Red Sea with the Mediterranean Sea. About.com Geography. Retrieved November 8, 2013, from http://geography.about.com/od/specificplacesofinterest

Milner, L. (2011, March 3). The Suez Crisis. BBC News. Retrieved November 8, 2013, from ;http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/modern/suez_01
Saundry, P., & Lowitz, M. (2008, June 24). Suez Canal, Egypt. Suez Canal, Egypt. Retrieved November 8, 2013, from http://www.eoearth.org/view/article/156309/

Suez Canal Authority. (n.d.). Suez Canal Authority. Retrieved November 8, 2013, from http://www.suezcanal.gov.eg/sc.aspx?show=8

The Suez Canal: history, figures, facts. (n.d.). RIA Novosti. Retrieved November 8, 2013, from http://en.ria.ru/infographics/20091113/156823327

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