In February 2016, Water. Desalination + reuse (Faversham House) reported, citing Daily News Egypt, that Singapore's Hyflux and the Japanese groups Mitsubishi and Toyota Tsusho had begun feasibility work on power and desalination plants in East Port Said, after an agreement in principle with the new Suez Canal Economic Zone. Its chairman Ahmed Darwish said the area needed desalination because it lacked its own water and lay far from the Nile. Soft ground would delay industry by two years, and treating it could cost EGP 25 billion (US$3.2 billion).
The report showed Egypt planning desalination as a foundation for new industrial zones along the Suez Canal and actively courting foreign investors to deliver it.