What happened to the huge budgetary allocations over the last ten years for desilting of canals in the perennially water scarce province of Sindh? This is a question, which, according to a Business Recorder news report from Hyderabad, (September 15), seems to be agitating the minds of many.
The disarray in the province's irrigation originated in the politically motivated irregularities of 1970s, compounded with the Zia years' attempts at placing the system back on track, and it was left to the present government to mount a gigantic effort to streamline the entire irrigation network in the province.
With this end in view, it has pledged Rs 27 billion for the launch of two parallel projects, designed to line 33,200 watercourses, and improve water distribution under the World Bank and national programme to check water losses to the tune of 15 to 20 MAF.
In order to execute the programme, the government has created a new force, which after a month's training, was posted in various parts of the province. However, the extension staff, was placed at the disposal of district governments for carrying out the work until the new staff took over. But the lack of co-ordination with various bodies, the work on the projects failed to achieve the desired pace to ensure completion on schedule.
This handicap, it is feared, will cause an increase in the cost of the project, thereby, threatening fulfilment of anticipated benefits, and even failure of the project. As for the causative bottlenecks, these have been identified as flawed policies and complicated procedure for approval of work.
In this regard, it is reported that thus far only 63 watercourses from national programme, and only two from World Bank programme have been completed, with as many as 143 under construction.
This is enough to expose the pathetic situation of these project, which calls for some extra measures to be taken immediately. Again, the World Bank sponsored project, launched by the Sindh On-farm Water Management, envisaged lining of 4,000 watercourses, 100 distributaries, 25 branch canals and precise land levelling of 40,000 hectares, all lagging far behind the schedule.
With no visible evidence of desilting of canals and watercourses, little remains to doubt that the capacity of water flow in almost all canals has declined to minimum level, resulting in deprivation of the tail-enders of their due share not only for irrigation but for drinking purposes too.
Agriculture in Sindh being largely dependent on its canal irrigation network, comprising three barrages, 14 main canals, 109 branch canals, 1446 distributaries, and 43,000 watercourses, almost all of them in bad shape, serious problems lie ahead. It will also be noted that withdrawal of water from the Indus River, through the three barrages, lies in the proximity of 36 to 44 MAF, depending on climatic conditions and availability of water in the river.
Moreover, water distributed to the farms through the irrigation network is hardly 16.5 MAF in winter and around 27 MAF in summer cropping season, due to conveyance losses from the river to farm gates. Several studies carried out by national and foreign experts have reportedly confirmed water conveyance losses to the extent of 30 to 40 percent due to seepage, spillage and topping of the water channels, besides mismanagement and corruption.
All this, put together, would certainly call for a determined expeditious efforts to rehabilitate the dilapidated irrigation network, with a marked emphasis on fighting inefficiency and corruption.