KARACHI, Oct 26: Some 1.2 million acres of agriculture land of eight Talukas of two districts has come under inundation because of sea intrusion near the delta.

The sea intrusion was caused by non-release of river water resulting in a loss of Rs100 billion to the province, said the provincial secretary for irrigation and power, Mohammed Hashim Leghari, while presiding over a meeting here on Saturday. At the meeting, the loss caused to agriculture was reviewed.

Mr Leghari said that because of the non-availability of river water to fall into the sea, agriculture land had suffered a great damage downstream of the Kotri barrage and in the delta region, and particularly the farmers of Thatta and Badin had suffered greatly.

Besides, it had caused grave damage to mangrove forests and reduced the production and breeding of shrimps, Leghari said, adding that if this situation continued, the province would have to face more losses.

He said that last week a meeting was held in Islamabad in which directive was issued for a comprehensive study for the solution of these problems. He said the Sindh government had demanded additional 10maf of water between Kotri Barrage and Indus Delta under the 1991 water accord.

The irrigation secretary told the meeting that not only this 1.2 million acre feet had been submerged under seawater, but out of 16 creeks at the Indus Delta only two creeks — Hajamro and Kharak — had got sweet water. This water too was available only when released from downstream of Kotri.

According to him, mangroves on some 0.7 million acres had been severely affected and according to a satellite survey, these had dwindled to mere 0.4 million acres. And even out of these, mangroves on only 125,000 acres were healthy.

He said that because of non-release of water downstream of Kotri, the Pallah fish of Sindh had almost become extinct and similarly the growth of large shrimps had also fallen resulting in reduced foreign exchange earning because of affected exports.

Hashim Leghari said that in such a situation, there was a great need to provide protection to mangrove forests, marine fisheries and environment besides solving the problems of coastal and delta oceanography.

The meeting was told that eight Talukas of Badin and Thatta districts had come under sea intrusion. These included 31,490 acres in Ghorabari, 590,000 in Shah Bandar, 117,823 in Karo Chhan, 60,173 in Mirpur Sakro, 226,663 in Jati, 113,900 in Keti Bandar, 30,625 in Golarchi and 49,179 acres in Badin Talukas.—APP