Water policy still up in the air owing to lack of consensus

Water policy could not be formulated during the last 30 years due to lack of consensus among stakeholders and was dropped from the agenda of Council of Common Interests (CCI), said the Ministry of Planning, Development and Reform here on Wednesday.
A Planning Commission official said that water is a very sensitive issue. He said that stakeholders could not develop consensus with respect to water policy and despite efforts of last 30 years, the policy is yet to see the daylight. This he stated while briefing the sub-committee of the Senate Standing Committee on Planning, Development and Reform.
Secretary Planning, Development and Reform, Shoaib Ahmed Siddiqui said that water conservation is a big challenge. The ministry further informed the committee that the prime minister has written a letter to chief secretary Balochistan for the construction of 13 small dams in district Khuzdar.
The meeting of subcommittee of the Standing Committee on Planning, Development and Reform held here on Wednesday that was attended by Senator Karim Ahmed Khawaja as convener and Senators Muhammad Mohsin Khan Leghari and Saeedul Hassan Mandokhail as its members.
The committee was convened by Senator Saeedul Hassan Mandokhail due to absence of convener subcommittee; however, the convener joined the meeting later as his flight got delayed due to technical problems. The representative from the Ministry of Ports and Shipping briefed the committee that the subject of developing jetties on ports did not come in the purview of the Ministry of Ports and Shipping and hence no allocation on the subject had been made in the ministerial Public Sector Development Program (PSDP).
The secretary Ministry of Planning, Development and Reform agreed and pointed out that developing, maintaining and planning for jetties was a provincial subject after devolution. He suggested that data on required areas could be collected from the provincial secretaries Livestock of Sindh and Balochistan. This suggestion was backed by Senator Muhammad Mohsin Khan Leghari who elaborated that such data would help determine the needs and resources required to initiate projects to develop jetties.
Senators Muhammad Mohsin Khan Leghari and Saeedul Hassan Mandokhail expressed deep concern over schemes for water conservation in the country, especially in Balochistan. The Planning Commission official briefed that two technologies were available to increase rainfall in the areas like Balochistan. The first method was to bombard clouds with silver chloride. The second method, developed by Russia, was to make use of electromagnetic distribution changes for rainfall. He suggested that Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA) can take the issue at hand and utilize these technologies to increase rainfall levels in the dry areas of Balochistan.
The final decision of the committee was to arrange a detailed visit of the coastal belt of Pakistan, including ports at Gwadar, Karachi and Bin Qasim to determine feasibility of making jetties. For further cooperation, in this regard, the provincial governments and provincial representatives of Planning Commission are to be approached.