18 July 2004	Sunday	29 Jamadi-ul-Awwal 1425

QUETTA, July 17: The federal government should abandon its programme of installing 1,000 tubewells in Balochistan to meet farmers' needs.

This was recommended by the participants of a one-day workshop on "Wise use of water in the perspective of drought in Balochistan" here on Friday. The seminar was jointly organized by Oxfam and Provincial Irrigation Department.

The participants urged the government to fully utilize flood water for resolving the water shortage. They also suggested that flat rate should be charged and subsidy to the landlords be withdrawn.

Irrigation Department Chief Engineer Mumtaz Khan said that around 80 per cent underground water channels and other water resources had dried up in but despite this 16,000 tubewells were using underground water, further depleting the water level.

Speaking on the occasion grower's representative Haji Noor Mohammad said the government pays Rs70,000 to 80,000 to the Wapda as a subsidy on each tubewell and suggested that this amount should be given to growers to enable them improve their agricultural yields.

Oxfam country chief Rehana Farooqi and provincial coordinator Mohammad Idrees, engineer Mohammad Usman Babai, engineer Mohammad Ashfaq, Oxfam Chagai coordinator Nasarullah also spoke.