The government of NWFP is all set to bring barren land of 14633 acres under cultivation in six different areas with the completion of six small dams constructed at the cost of Rs 1.692 billion. "Six dams are all set to become operational and start supplying water for irrigate purpose by the end of the current financial year of the province," said an official of the Small Dams Organisation of the Department of Irrigation while talking to Business Recorder on Saturday.
The six dams that near completion are included Palai Dam (Charsadda), Karak Dam (Karak), Lowaghar Dam (Karak), Dar Malik Dam (Kohat), Khyber Bara Dam (Haripur) and Jabba Dam in district Nowshera would become operational before June, 2010.
The dams, he said besides, provision of water for irrigation of 14633 acres agricultural land would also drinking water for the residents of the areas concerned. "According to the policy of the organisation, it is bound to supply 4 percent water of the dam to the people for drinking purposes," added Aftab Alam, Assistant Engineer, Small Dams Organisation.
Regarding the achievement of the organisation the official said construction work on 20 more small dams was in progress while feasibility of 27 dams had been completed. Similarly, the designing of the construction of 10 dams had been completed while feasibilities of 11 dams have been released while preliminary investigation of 50 other dams is completed and is ready for further study.
The organisation established in 2001 had so far constructed seven dams, including Gandyali Dam (Kohat), Chanda Fateh Khan Dam (Kohat), Azakhel Dam (Peshawar), Naryab Dam (Hangu), Sharki Dam (Karak) and Chunguz Dam in district Karak respectively.
These projects, Aftab Alam said not only irrigating a vast agricultural land of 21000 acres, but also providing drinking water to the people of the area. He said that the additional benefits of construction of small dams are generation of recreational facilities, fisheries development and ground water charge.
To a question about the benefits of the construction of small dams, he said in the declining water table ground water recharge is the need of the hour, which could be achieved only through constructing small dams. The total gross area of NWFP excluding Fata, he said is 18.4 million acres and out of this gross area cultivable area is 6.72 million acres of which only 2.332 million acres is under regular irrigation system in the province.
Fifty six percent of the 2.332 million acres cultivable area is irrigated through flow irrigation (canal system) and remaining, 4.44 percent from lift irrigation, 4.03 percent irrigated through tube-wells and sub-total of 35.16 percent through civil canals.
The idea of the necessity for conservation of rain and flood water was considered by the government due to drought in the recent past considering it the only solution to combat drought conditions in water scarce area to provide water for irrigation, potable water, water and recharge of the ground water aquifer.
The in-hand small dams projects, he said can improve the available assured irrigation capacity of the province by 13 percent. The construction of the various dams, under Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP), would convert 41735 uncultivable land into cultivatable and 40,000 people would be supplied drinking water while the construction of 8 other small and medium dams would add 136110 acres to the cultivable area with provision of potable water to 115,000 people. The construction of Palai and Kundal Dams would add 8710 acres to cultivation and drinking water for 10,000 people. The dams, whose feasibility study has been completed would irrigate 35166 acres and would provide drinking water for 35000 people.
Under the provincial annual development programme, pre-feasibility study schemes would irrigate 60,000 lands and supply drinking water to 75,000 persons. Thus from the schemes in progress both under PSDP and ADP would irrigate 0.281 million acres land beside drinking water supplies, ground water recharge and fisheries development. "Through the utilisation of the small dam potentials of the province, the provincial government can increase the present irrigation system by more than 30 percent," concluded the official.
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