ISLAMABAD, March 31: The government is likely to put in place very soon a legal framework to control over-extraction of groundwater and withdraw prevailing subsidies on tubewells in view of fast deteriorating groundwater level in the country.

This has been suggested in a report submitted to President Gen Pervez Musharraf recently. The report was prepared jointly by federal flood commission of the water and power ministry, Pakistan Council of Research in Water Resources of the ministry of science, ministry of food, agriculture and livestock and Pakistan Meteorological Department of the ministry of defence.

Official sources told Dawn that the government has been advised to regulate and properly price through legislation the groundwater extraction to reduce and control over extraction and existing subsidies be withdrawn henceforth.

“Uncontrolled abstraction of groundwater has played havoc in terms of quantity and quality in the arid areas of Balochistan and parts of Punjab and Sindh”, said the report prepared by all the relevant ministries.

The planning commission projections for the year 2004 regarding water potential and demand at farmgate suggested a shortfall of 14.9 million acre feet (MAF). The estimates indicate that total availability for the year 2004 would be around 134.9 MAF against actual requirement of 149.8 MAF.

The aquifer in Pakistan has been built due to direct recharge from natural precipitation, river flow and the continued seepage from the conveyance system of canals, distributaries and water courses and application losses in the irrigated lands during the last 90 years.

This aquifer with a potential of about 50 MAF is being exploited to an extent of about 40 MAF by over 562,000 private tubewells and about 16,000 public tubewells. All these tubewells are provided with more than 50 per cent subsidy in electricity.

Particularly in Balochistan, groundwater extracted through dug wells, tubewells, springs and Karezes is the main dependable source of water for irrigation of orchards and other cash crops. In two basins of Pishin-Lora and Nari in Balochistan and Lahore area in Punjab the groundwater is being over exploited beyond development potentials creating mining conditions and causing a huge overdraft of groundwater that is threatening drying up of the aquifers in the long term.

Various artificial recharge measures would be tried and experimented upon during the forthcoming financial year in these areas where depletion of aquifers is becoming a serious problem.

A focal point organization preferably Pakistan Council of Research on Water Resources (PCRWR) would be directed to monitor the progress of the implementation of strategies and their effect on overall water availability for crop use, drinking and other purposes.

In the short-term, the report suggested that in plain areas where grain and crops like cotton, wheat and maize are grown, bed and furrow irrigation methods should be made mandatory for adoption by farmers to increase the application efficiency of water.

It suggested precision land levelling to increase efficiencies in the plain areas and introduction of laser-guided land levelling with local cost effective technology.

Similarly, farmers in upland areas with undulating topography should be encouraged to use high efficiency irrigation systems like trickle, bubbler and sprinkler to conserve water. For this demonstration plots on cost-sharing basis would be established in the country.

The report proposed that an extensive social awareness campaign should be launched using mass media means and village-to-village campaign of extension services. Furthermore, effective extension service mechanism must be developed to transfer new and efficient irrigation methods, technologies and practices to farmer.

Tax holiday has also been proposed to encourage local industries to manufacture components of the system besides bank loans to develop high efficiency irrigation systems.

Water user organisations in irrigated areas would be motivated to solve the problems related to water use because of their presence at grass root level.