FAISALABAD, Jan 18: Standing Rabi crops over 3.005 million acres in the Faisalabad irrigation zone will be affected owing to decline in canal water share by the provincial authorities in the wake of overall scarcity of water.

The irrigation zone, comprising districts of Faisalabad, Jhang, Toba Tek Singh, Hafizabad and partly areas of Sheikhupura and Gujranwala, has a total command area of 3.005 million acres.

The irrigation authorities confirmed that the water shortage would leave a negative impact on the standing Rabi crops if the country did not receive rains in the near future.

According to the Punjab irrigation authorities, both the sources - Lower Chenab Canal West and Lower Chenab Canal East - have become almost dry following the suspension of water supply.

The supply of water from LCC West will resume from Tuesday (Jan 18) after a lapse of 22 days while the LCC East will remain closed till Feb 10 which had been closed on Jan 11.

Agricultural experts told the correspondent that in most of the areas of irrigation zone, growers could not complete sowing in time due to the non-availability of water as a result the target of Rabi crops could not be achieved.

The irrigation sources revealed that during January, the Faisalabad zone growers would get 5,000 cusec water against the previous year's share of 6,000 cusecs. The zone has the capacity of 8,300 cusecs, however, the same is not being provided to farmers.

For February, the zone will get 2,500 cusecs against last year's supply of 9,000. In March, 4,000 cusecs would be provided to growers against the last year's supply of 10,000 cusecs. The experts claimed that water shortage would also affect the sowing of next Kharif crop.