KARACHI, Oct 8: Unavailability of drinking water is one of the major problems being faced by the villages located along the coastline of Sindh and Balochistan, a survey shows.

Apart from the availability of potable water, lack of health and educational facilities are also listed as major issues in these villages where teachers, doctors and paramedics, if appointed, do not come to attend their duties.

Villagers meet their water requirements either through ponds or lakes, or purchase water from tankers at exorbitant rates, thereby putting additional burden on their already meagre income.

By and large, the population of these villages are fishermen and their livelihood depends on fisheries sector, which contributes a significant share to the national exchequer, but the fisher folk communities are poor, marginalised and deprived of basic amenities.

The situation is even grimmer in remote areas of Hawkesbay where people have been facing lots of problems due to the non-availability of public transport and absence of proper road network.

The government’s apathy could be judged from the fact that its officials hardly visit these villages. A villager told Dawn that the lack of public transport system had made life more miserable as they had to transport all daily commodities from other city areas to the villages. The survey shows that the most of the people live in abject poverty because of the collapse of coastal economy being under pressure due to large-sized mechanised fleet of boats, which had badly affected the fishing activity of small boat owners.

For quite some time, the fishing communities living along the coast of Sindh and Balochistan have been demanding of the government to impose a ban on fishing of “factory ships”, a term used for foreign trawlers.

They also called for a special development plan for the coastal areas so as to provide them all basic amenities.

An elderly fisherman admitted that mechanised fishing by foreign trawlers had ruined the coastal economy. He suggested that a master plan for the development of coastal areas be prepared and steps be taken for providing alternate means of income to the fishermen.

He also emphasised the need to improve the infrastructure facilities including water supply in the coastal villages.