Kharif crops: Sindh government out to dewater farmlands

The Sindh government on Wednesday replaced an approved development scheme with the dewatering project to get inundated farmlands ready for Kharif season 2011, especially the paddy crop, it is reliably learnt. Officials in Sindh Agriculture Department told Business Recorder that the department has moved a summary to the Chief Minister office to replace an allocated Rs 95 million scheme with the dewatering project to make submerged agricultural land cultivatable for coming Kharif season.
The department has planned to purchase water pumps for drainage of floodwater from farmlands before December 31. They said the department had approved a scheme to purchase laser-levelling equipment as per Annual Development Programme 2010-11, but it has decided to replace the scheme and to purchase water pumps to dewater agriculture land.
They said floods had destroyed crops and submerged farmlands, which are popular for Kharif cultivation in the province. As there was no time to prepare these submerged lands for current Rabi season, the department had decided to complete dewatering project by December 31 and make the lands cultivatable for coming season, but the plan was unfortunately not materialised, they said.
To make this submerged land cultivatable for Kharif crops and to avoid likely food crisis in the country, the agriculture department has decided to purchase water pumps to make destroyed land ready for sowing, they added. They said President Asif Ali Zardari had directed to drain out standing floodwater from the farmlands of the province and to make it cultivatable before December 31. Sindh Irrigation Department was given a task to complete this project before the designated time period.
To pace-up the process, the department has decided to replace approved scheme with dewatering project to complete the process before December 31, they said. On the other hand, the provincial irrigation department has refused to own the responsibility of dewatering submerged farmlands. Requesting anonymity, a top official in the department said drainage of floodwater from cultivatable lands is the responsibility of the district government and the department was just assigned to plug breaches and to strengthen weakened embankments.