HYDERABAD: Success of irrigation system under farmers’ bodies sure: seminar
Bureau Report
HYDERABAD, June 25: The provincial coordination cell of the National Drainage Programme, Sindh, in collaboration with the Sindh Irrigation and Drainage Authority (Sida), United Nations Office for Project Services (UNOPS), and the Sindh Agricultural and Forestry Workers Coordination Organization (SAFWCO) organized an information dissemination seminar on participatory irrigation management at a local hotel on Monday.
Addressing the first session of the seminar, Syed Ali Mir Shah, Sindh minister for irrigation and power, said many farmers organizations will be formed and more than 100,000 people will be provided training within 10 years.
He said it is a big and challenging task for the experts and trainers to make participatory irrigation system a success.
He said that though some irregularities had been reported after independence but these increased 1970 onwards resulting in corruption and mismanagement in the irrigation system, and the worst situation compelled the government to bring reforms in the system by shifting its management to the beneficiaries.
He said now the chairman of the Area Water Board has been made responsible for the distribution of water.
Advocating the new system of irrigation, the Sindh minister said that there were three factors involved in the development of any country, which included education, increases in export, and shifting of the management from the public to the private sector or beneficiaries.
He hoped that by implementation of the system the equitable distribution of water would be ensured.
The second session was chaired by provincial minister for agriculture, forest and fisheries, Hassan Ali Chanhio.
In his remarks, he stressed upon the Sida to make canals and distributaries functional before handing them over to the farmers’ organizations and ensure that inspection of paths and embankments of canals were strengthened.
The majority of the growers who attended the seminar were of the opinion that the Sida and irrigation department had not yet succeeded in improving the water distribution system and demanded that serious efforts should be made to improve the system without delay.
An irrigation expert, Mumtaz Ali Memon in his paper stressed the need for the optimum use of irrigation water.
He pointed out that the entire effluent of Hyderabad was being disposed of in the Phuleli canal, and added that this was simply inconceivable in other countries.
Another expert, Ahmed Junaid Memon said that 98 per cent of water resources throughout the world were brackish and therefore one should be extremely careful in the use of water.
The president of Sindh Chamber of Agriculture, Syed Qamaruzzaman Shah, said that the department concerned has so far failed to improve the irrigation system and the work on the lining of water courses had not been started as yet.
He said even the Sida which had been in existence for the last five years had not been able to show any results.
The president of Sindh Abadgar Board, Abdul Majeed Nizamani, lamented that the problems of the growers had not been resolved as yet.
The president of Sindh Taraqqi Pasand Mallah Tanzeem, Arab Mallah, said that due to non-availability of water in downstream Kotri life had been paralyzed in the Indus Delta.
