Despite on-going military operation in Waziristan Agency the contractors and Wapda officials are confident about timely completion of the multipurpose Gomal Zam dam, ie before June 2006.
Rasheed Khan Bangash, Project Director, Gomal Zam Dam Project, while briefing a group of Lahore-based journalists who visited the project sites said concrete lined diversion tunnel had been completed and the river had been diverted. Bridge at Gardavi had already been completed while work on rehabilitation of 34-km access road started in April was in progress and hopefully it would be finished by September this year.
Moreover, Steel Bridge had arrived at Port Qasim and was under the process of clearance for transportation to the site.
Responding to a question regarding the pace of work, he said that 10.2 percent work on the project had been completed against the target of 40.6 percent due to a number of factors, and hoped the project would be completed as per schedule in June 2006.
It would bring green revolution and enable the Wapda to provide cheaper electricity to Tank and D I Khan districts.
The project, he maintained, was being implemented under 'Vision-2025 programme' of Wapda, mainly through an EPC/turnkey contract with joint venture of China National Water Resources- Harbin Power Engineering, in association with the designer M/s TIDI, China, submitting the lowest bid of Rs 4.388 billion in June 2002.
The site of Gomal Zam Dam is about 60-km to the west of district Tank of NWFP. The main objective of the project was to irrigate 163,086 acres of D I Khan Division besides generating 17.4 mega watt electricity.
The dam will have a gross storage capacity of 1.14 million-acre feet with live storage of 0.892 million-acre feet due to reservoir spreading over about five-kilometre on River Gomal, which has annual inflow of 511 MCM. It is a roller compacted concrete gravity dam of 437 feet height with length of 758 feet with 4,330 cumecs spillway discharge. The project was inaugurated by President General Pervez Musharraf on August 22, 2001 and it ranks amongst fast track priority projects of Wapda.
The project director further said that work on Gomal Zam dam project was in full swing and the engineers recently had diverted the River Gomal through a 392-metre concrete lined diversion tunnel to start work on main dam and spillway with the completion of coffer dam and 97 percent design work of the project.
Foundations for 132-kv transmission lines are under construction and towers are being erected to ensure immediate supply after the completion of the project, he said and out of total 160 towers, 20 had been erected while another 30 were ready for installation.
According to him, machinery has been imported from China, Japan and Germany and as many as 800 people were working in the various sections of the project, including more than 100 Chinese workers. He also informed the media that another project of same nature, 32-km upstream Bannu project, in North Waziristan was also on cards, which after completion, would bring another 84,000 acres of land under cultivation besides generation of 65 mega watt of electricity.
Speaking about life of the project, he said it would be 50 years with 12 percent economic rate of return with 1.18:1 cost benefit ratio.
As far as the benefits of the project were concerned, he pointed out were both tangible and intangible: the tangible benefits would increase agricultural output under perennial irrigation and hydropower generation; while intangible benefits include increase in employment opportunities, economic activity in agriculture sector and trade and commerce, and improvement in income level of people. The project would also benefit the irrigation sector and would boost overall annual cropping intensity from the present 15.8 percent to 86.5 percent, the project director claimed.
About socio-environmental implications, Rasheed Khan Bagish said it was a unique project having zero impact on the environment.
To a question about the security measures for workers at the site of the dam, he said sufficient arrangements had been made in this regard and there was no such concern among the workers. However, he kept mum when asked about the perils of the ongoing military operation in the adjacent area of the dam site but said it would not affect the pace of development work of the project.
Hua, the Chines Project Director, present on the occasion said: "Pakistan-China are time-tested friends and we feel no fear while working in a friendly country. We completed many other projects in Pakistan and feel comfortable while working at the dam site."
The Chinese workers were fully satisfied with the security measures being adopted by the government, he added.
Answering a question, he said all Chinese workers were aware of the prevailing situation in Wana, "but it has nothing to do with our work on the dam site. He also expressed the hope to complete the project before its scheduled time.
Later, the Chinese workers warmly received the journalists at their residential site located near to the project. Wapda consultants, management of the Chinese company and high officials working on the project were also present.