Water Shortage -- A Way Out

Pakistan, like the rest of the developing world is headed for serious water shortage in the near future. The current drought in Sindh and Balochistan has highlighted this long-developing problem. Based on the work of the Worldwatch Inst, the author outlines

three areas where work needs to begin. Appropriate solutions exist to solve these problems. The author would be happy to hear from experts who could assist. Also leads to web sites relevant to this problem would help.

In the 50s, Quetta was considered Pakistan’s prime orchard, capable of providing fruit for the country and export. Rising population, over-use of ground water, and natural droughts, now threaten the existence of its remaining growing areas.
Kinghar lake in Sindh has for years been short of water as is most of that province and technocrats shout for yet another big dam to store water at Kalabagh. The posh Defense Society in Karachi exists on tankers ferrying water for the lush gardens, car washes and endless showers. Lyari dwellers unable to pay the middleman for water make do with little, disease-ridden,water.
Here, near the western edge of Islamabad, where I live, I rush some mornings at sunrise to get the city tankers to provide water. Its first use ends up as a daily car wash by the batman of my upstairs neighbor, a military captain! Unfazed, the city authority continues to build more sectors when it can barely meet the modest requirements of present inhabitants.
Viewed from space, our planet seems flushed with water. Yet most of the earth’s blueness is the ocean, too salty for humans and agriculture. Only about 2.5 percent of the water is freshwater, and two-third of that is locked in glaciers and icecaps. Less than one-hundredth of one percent is drinkable and renewed each year through precipitation. The amount available per person has fallen steadily. It has dropped by about 60% since 1950, as the population climbed from 2.5 billion to 6 billion, an will fall and additional 33 percent within fifty years if our numbers reach 9 billion, the middle of the projected range.
As expected, the shortage affects mainly the poor. More than a billion people lack potable water, and nearly 3 billion lack even minimal sanitation. The World Health Organization estimates that 250 million cases of water-related diseases such as cholera arise annually, resulting in 5-10 million deaths. Intestinal worms infect some 1.5 billion people, killing nearly 100,000 a year. Tens of millions of poor farming families cannot afford to irrigate their land, which lowers their crop production and leaves them vulnerable to drought.
Much of the earth stable year-round supply resides in aquifers, some of which formed over thousands of years and are not being replenished. In ones which are, the extraction far exceeds what the annual rains provide. In California, which provides half of America’s fruits and vegetables, like Quetta, aquifers are overdrawn. In India, a 1996 report found that in critical farming regions the water table was dropping precipitously, and jeopardizing perhaps as much as one-fourth of the country’s grain harvest. Similar conditions afflict China, and Pakistan.
The world’s urban population is expected to double to 5 billion by 2025,which will further increase diversion of water from agriculture to the city. This will exacerbate the rural to urban migration, and overall food production.
Competition for water is also a issues to be resolved between many countries that share over 250 rivers with their neighbors. Egypt for example uses two-third of the Nile-water. Being at the tail end, it gets only what Ethiopia does not use. With increasing demands upstream and Egypt pursuing two large irrigation projects, it is on collision course with its neighbor. After, the peace accord with Israel, Anwar Sadat had warned that Egypt will wage war for water. And he was referring to Ethiopia.
The tragic depletion of the Aral Sea in the former Soviet Union, and the major loss of surrounding ecosystems, was due to the rivers that fed it being diverted into agriculture and industry. It would be easy to blame this on centralized planning. The delta of the Colorado River, however, displays similar lack of care for the ecosystem.
According to experts at the Worldwatch Institute, the challenge of water shortage can be met without further destroying the aquatic ecosystems around the world. There are three important actions that are needed: double productivity of the water allocated to human activities, extend the water resources to the poor, and allocate water to maintain the natural ecologies.
Like humans, natural ecosystems require a minimum amount of water for
survival. Australia and South Africa are now leading the way in repairing the damage done to ecosystems by making water managers allocate water for the protection of ecosystems as well as for human needs. In America, the San Francisco area and the Everglades national park are being healed through federal government intervention.
The recent debate against the Kalabagh dam from an ecological perspective attacks the planners disregard for such concerns. For example the effect of reduced flows in the delta region of the Indus and it effect on the mangrove forests is often overlooked by technocrats whose narrow vision is limited to power production and water storage mainly.
Efficient use of water is needed in, agriculture which uses 70% of all fresh water that is available. Of this less than half does not reach the plants. Much progress can be made here. Drip irrigation, in which a perforated plastic pipe, installed on or below the surface, gradually supplies water is a means of conserving water and increasing productivity. By reducing evaporation losses it delivers 95% of the water to the plant, compared with 50-70 percent for the more conventional flood and furrow irrigation methods. Besides saving water, tests in several countries such as Israel, India, Spain and the US have shown that drip irrigation not only saves 30-70 percent water but also increases crop yield between 20-90 percent. These improvements are enough to double water productivity. Since only 1 percents of all irrigation globally uses this method, it has big potential. Once farmers and others begin to pay the real cost of water, the additional expenditure for laying of the perforated pipes will be considered a bargain. Much of today’s waste comes from the lack of equitable and metered use of water resources. This will become increasingly untenable.
Efficiency in the domestic water use can save a lot. In the US, the
National Energy Policy Act of 1992 set standards for household plumbing fixtures -- toilets, faucets and showerheads. By 2025, water usage in homes will be down by one-third than it would have been without new standards. In Pakistan, such standards could lead to new industrial opportunities for manufacturers, in addition to reducing waste. Re-use of municipal wastewater, up to two-thirds, as done in Israel, can be used for crop production after treatment to remove toxins. In Japan for example, there are washbasins, which are combined or retrofitted with the toilet bowl, allowing the wastewater from the basin to be used for flushing. Such innovations can be adapted for use here.
The most important component of the solution to the water security issue is that of providing water and sanitation services to the poor. With access to affordable irrigation millions of poor farmers can raise their productivity and incomes directly, thereby reducing hunger and poverty.
In many cases the price of water for the poor becomes many times higher than what the affluent pay, and even sometime more than what people pay in the US. A study of water pricing in Lyari from the late1970s indicated that the price of a gallon of water was nearly fifty times what the rich paid in the affluent sections of the city. As things go, the differential is greater now.
Lacking piped water, many must buy from vendors who charge outrageous
prices, often for low-quality water. This can all be changed with a slight reordering of global priorities. Estimates for providing universal access and sanitation can be as high as $50 billion a year, which is only 7 percent of the world’s outlay on arms. Water for those who need it most will provide greater security than provided by these weapons.
Low cost appropriate technologies when properly employed can help. Here the example of the treadle pump’s use in Bangladesh is worth emulating. This manually operated pump, priced at $35 has helped farmers to pump water in the dry season, allowing them to grow an extra crop of rice and vegetables, instead of letting the land lie fallow. So far, Bangladeshi farmers have bought 1.2 million treadle pumps, thereby raising the productivity of more than 600 thousand acres of farmland. This has added an additional $325 million a year into the poorest parts of the economy. A private sector network of manufacturers, 830 dealers and 2,500 installers support the technology, creating jobs and raising income in urban areas as well. There as many simple, clever technologies that can make a significant cut in wateruse and also increase productivity.
Finally, the way water is priced, supplied and allocated has to be changed. Large government subsidies for irrigation, estimated at $33 billion a year worldwide, keep prices artificially low, and so fail to penalize the wasteful farmer. Inflexible laws discourage the marketing of water, leading to inefficient distribution and use. Aquifers continue to get depleted due to over-extraction of water, in the absence of regulations. Natural ecosystems and their dependence on water has been overlooked until far too little water is left there.
The current drought conditions have made people conscious of the precariousness of water supplies in our country. It is now for the government to swiftly move toward making the required changes in regulations that would help conservation and better distribution. It needs to look at innovative, appropriate technologies and propagate them through the media and extension services. All this will require an enlightened leadership willing to tackle one of the most critical issues in the coming years.