Kalabagh Dam is most important for pakistan:::Wapda chief

While focus on building new water reservoirs to cope with the demand of a growing population, the country’s top water and power authority has called the Kalabagh Dam ‘technically’ viable but said it is up to the political leadership to decide the fate of the controversial project.

“Without consensus among the provinces, we would not initiate work on Kalabagh dam. If all the political parties develop consensus, then Kalabagh Dam must be built,”

He expressed concerns over less water storage capacity which led to water crisis in Pakistan. Hussain said that Pakistan had storage capacity of water for only 30 days whereas India had water storage for 170 days.

“As we start work on the project, people do fire at us due to which so far a dozen of us have been killed,” he said. So far Rs80 billion has been spent on this project. He said that the plan for relocating the people was wrong that was made in 2006. “We have given proposals for rehabilitation of people, but so far they have not been accepted,” he said.

The committee it was informed that any country that has 1000 cubic meter water available per capita is categorised in water scarce countries and per capita water availability in Pakistan at present in 903 cubic meters. This average per capita water availability was around 5000 cubic meters back in 1951.

The committee was told that out of 35,409 Million Acre Feet (MAF) reservoirs in the whole world, 1,577 MAF are in South Asia and only 145 MAF in Pakistan. Chairman Wapda in his briefing said that 25-35% of water comes from rains and 65-75% from glaciers in the northern parts.

He said the rapid population growth had outdone water storage capacity of the country and the only solution was to build more reservoirs and change the obsolete water management infrastructure.

He observed that 60% of population is directly engaged in agriculture and livestock and despite being included in 15 most water scarce countries, Pakistan has one of the most water intensive agriculture with fourth highest use of water rate. He said 90% of country’s water is used in agriculture and the need of the hour is to take this matter up in the Council of Common Interests as to how overuse of water in irrigation can be reduced and use the same for domestic needs.

He proposed that cultivation of sugarcane must be discouraged for being most water consuming crop. Various bigwigs have sugar mills, but this crops cultivation should be reduced as they are more water consuming, he added.

The chairman Wapda while giving an analysis of water reservoirs told the meeting that Pakistan has a total of 155 dams against 5102 dams of India. He remarked that Pakistan needs to narrow the huge gap between the growing population and its needs and the number and capacity of water reservoirs.

According to the Wapda chief, about 60% of the population is directly engaged in agriculture and livestock and despite being included in 15 most water-scarce countries, Pakistan has one of the most water-intensive agriculture with fourth highest water use rate.

Talking about the Indus Cascade, he termed it the most precious asset for the country. He told that the Indus enters Pakistan at an altitude of 8430 feet and gives us a drop of 7030 feet till kalabagh at an altitude of 1400 feet giving us multiple sites along the stretch for building reservoirs and run of the river projects.