{"id":60581,"date":"2016-08-07T23:09:18","date_gmt":"2016-08-07T18:09:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/?p=60581"},"modified":"2016-08-07T23:09:21","modified_gmt":"2016-08-07T18:09:21","slug":"small-dams-and-restoring-life-line-in-pakistan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pamirtimes.net\/en\/2016\/08\/07\/small-dams-and-restoring-life-line-in-pakistan\/","title":{"rendered":"Small Dams and Restoring life line in Pakistan"},"content":{"rendered":"

By<\/strong>\u00a0SYED MUJAHID ALI SHAH<\/strong><\/p>\n

Pakistan is a nation likely to struck with historical floods in the wake of climate change in the coming years, paralysing its single most important source of employment and base of export-agriculture which caters above 170 million people giving livelihood to\u00a066% of national\u00a0population\u00a0employing 43.4% of work force\u00a0is facing a historical economic crisis, Agriculture in Pakistan generates 20.9% of the state\u2019s GDP mostly coming from agricultural land, irrigated with Indus Basin River System (IBRS).\u00a0The sector under devastation, being strongly linked with food security, poverty alleviation, and\u00a0rural development is going to generate\u00a0multiplier effects. In all cultivated area of\u00a019.63 million hectares, IBRS irrigates\u00a0total agricultural land of18.22 million hectors which is above 90 percent of the total and makes the irrigation system of the country, the largest in the world.<\/p>\n

The new born nation\u00a0in the holy month of Ramadan,\u00a0on\u00a0August 14, 1947, initiated its\u00a0life line project of Indus Basin Replacement Works Project (IBRWP)\u00a0with the\u00a0help of World Bank; initially the system irrigated\u00a039.54 million acres. Now as\u00a0\u00a0IRBS it has been irrigating nearly 20 million hectors consisting the\u00a0Indus River and its major tributaries of Ravi, Chenab, Sutluj, Jehlum and Kabul which pass through three major reservoirs of Mangla ( constructed in 1967), Chashma ( constructed in 1971) and\u00a0Tarbela (constructed in 1975).There have been\u00a019 barrages, 12\u00a0link canals, 43 canal commands, and over 107,000 watercourses. The length of canals of the sysetm in total makes 61,000 km with watercourses, farm channels, and field ditches which stretches another 1.6\u00a0million km. Typical watercourse commands range from 200 to 700 acres.<\/p>\n

The hugest volume of water so far recorded in the history of\u00a0Pakistan\u00a0,developed from monsoon rains in the northern higher mount belts in Khyber Pakhtunkhaw and\u00a0Kashmir\u00a0has totally devastated IBRS the nations life line by inundating it\u00a0\u00a0with\u00a0\u00a0floods going 40-50 Km wide and flowing with more than a million cusecs of water.<\/p>\n

Although\u00a0\u00a0IRBS is fed with\u00a0more than 90 percent of total flowing water\u00a0by\u00a0Upper Indus Basin comprising a high mountain formation of Himalayas, Karakoram, Hindukush and Pamir ranges\u00a0containing the greatest area of\u00a022,000 km2\u00a0perennial glacial ice outside the polar regions in the world recently named as\u00a0Third Pole;\u00a0in Gilgit Baltistan, Chitral and Kashmir regions ,but monsoon rains contribute much for\u00a0Rabi\u00a0crops in early summers when glaciers\u00a0thaw is still slow and melt\u00a0five times less than that of\u00a0Kharif\u00a0season.\u00a0Monsoons are also becoming more important from a futuristic point of keeping the fast melting glaciers scenario in mind. Studies have shown that land surface temperatures have risen more than sea surface temperatures and that\u00a0temperatures in higher elevations are rising more rapidly which means increase in monsoon as due to change in seasonal cycle but recession of glaciers most of which are out of monsoon range being on the northern face of Himalayas.<\/p>\n

But containing the monsoon water for\u00a0Kharif\u00a0crops necessitate reservoirs. Especially when the weather is becoming historically unpredictable year to year thanks to climate change. The flooding as that of present are not only a loss of water in bulk but also create devastation out of ones imagination. To avoid the situation major dams and reservoires are necessary to be built.<\/p>\n

Diamer-Bhasha Dam with a capacity of \u00a08,107,132\u00a0acre\u00b7ft water reservation\u00a0\u00a04,500\u00a0megawatts\u00a0of electricity may be a revolutionary step towards agricultural development and power generation because such dams are\u00a0becoming a need of time for both water source for agriculture in drought as well as coping flooding specially when the increasing temperature due to changing climate pose uncertain conditions sometimes severe drought sometimes devastating floods.<\/p>\n

Similarly \u00a0the major reservoir project of Kalabagh Dam in the monsoon zone is also necessary but under political manoeuvring\u00a0\u00a0so far since it was planned in 1984,\u00a0mainly opposed by Khyber Pukhtunkhaw province.The dam \u00a0can contain a big part of rain water having a reserving capacity of 8 million acre feet (MAF)\u00a0coming from the northern hights , Khaybar Pakhtunkhaw of which 6 MAF can be used for agriculture.<\/p>\n

having said that the mega projects of big dams are always exposed to\u00a0\u00a0impacts of ecological changes and failure\u00a0risks besides\u00a0political\u00a0controversies specially attached to Kalabagh .<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
The alternate projects of medium and small dams like Dasu Dam, Attabad Dam are more effective and can be more quick to be completed till the mega dam project is not completed and on Kalabagh we dont reach on any national consensus , the nation cannot simply wait and see further destruction\u00a0from floods\u00a0and drought situations due to dry weather specially when climate change takes radical lines on both conditions.
\nThe government should impose emergency and start constructing small catchments and medium sized dams on Indus River in Gilgit Baltistan and KPK region \u00a0which can help containing heavy rainfall and save the downstream areas from inundating .They can also be used for irrigation and power generation. Such projects are relatively less time taking, can solve power generation crisis within limited time, low costly and\u00a0less destructive in case of failure.<\/p>\n

Syed\u00a0Mujahid\u00a0Ali Shah is a nature conservationist\/ecologist, freelance writer, researcher and teacher based in Nagar.<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By\u00a0SYED MUJAHID ALI SHAH Pakistan is a nation likely to struck with historical floods in the wake of climate change in the coming years, paralysing its single most important source of employment and base of export-agriculture which caters above 170 million people giving livelihood to\u00a066% of national\u00a0population\u00a0employing 43.4% of work force\u00a0is facing a historical economic 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