THIS refers to the news item ‘Ecnec approves 15 projects worth Rs333bn’ (March 3).

The project aims at reducing water demand in Sindh through three types of intervention: watercourse improvement tops the list and rightfully so.

As our watercourses are sandy, they cause the following: water seeps underground. If subsoil water is salty, this seepage is irretrievable. Grass and weeds’ growth inside watercourses decreases the flow area.

This grass and weed consume our precious and declining water resource. With the same input of water and with decreased flow in the cross-sectional area in watercourses, water overflows.

Water does not reach the tail-end customer. Out of the 32 million acre feet (MAF) of water that we lose each year on an average, 12 MAF gets lost through watercourses.

Some make brick-lined watercourses, but they leak too.

The Indian government and farmers are aware of the price of their water and they use it frugally.

There is a massive government and private sector spending on the conversion of watercourses into water pipelines. By doing so, they are effectively eliminating all the ills that are listed above.

Will we learn from them or will we exhaust our water?

SNIR

Karachi

Published in Dawn, April 19th, 2015

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