WORKING PAPER 85 Drought Mitigation Drought Series. Paper 3 in Pakistan: Current Status and Options for Future Strategies Shahid Ahmad, Zahid Hussain, Asaf Sarwar Qureshi, Rashida Majeed and Mohammad Saleem Postal Address P O Box 2075 Colombo Sri Lanka Location 127, Sunil Mawatha Pelawatta Battaramulla Sri Lanka Telephone +94-11 2787404 Fax +94-11 2786854 E-mail [email protected] Website http://www.iwmi.org SM International International Water Management IWMI isaFuture Harvest Center Water Management Institute supportedby the CGIAR ISBN: 92-9090-580-8 Institute Working Paper 85 Drought Mitigation in Pakistan: Current Status and Options for Future Strategies Shahid Ahmad, Zahid Hussain, Asaf Sarwar Qureshi, Rashida Majeed and Mohammad Saleem International Water Management Institute i IWMI receives its principal funding from 58 governments, private foundations, and international and regional organizations known as the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR)# Support is also given by the Governments of Ghana, Pakistan, South Africa, Sri Lanka and Thailand# The authors: Shahid Ahmad is the Senior Director in Water Resources Directorate of Pakistan Agricultural Research Council (PARC), Islamabad Zahid Hussain is the Director of Water Resources Research Institute of PARC, Islamabad Asaf Sarwar Qureshi is Assistant Professor at the Department of Irrigation and Drainage of the University of Agriculture, Faisalabad Rashida Majeed is a Student in Water Engineering and Management at the Asian Institute of Technology, Bangkok, Thailand and Mohammad Saleem is a Research Officer at the Water Resources Research Institute of PARC, Islamabad The authors are grateful to many stakeholders in research institutions, government agencies and NGOs, with whom consultations were held during the course of this study The support provided by Messrs Zakir Hussain, Deputy Director, Water Resources Directorate, PARC and Mr Fateh Khan Nizamani, Project Director, Rod-Kohi, Thana Boula Khan, Sindh in conducting the socioeconomic survey of the drought impacts in Sindh and Baluchistan is duly acknowledged The authors would like to thank IWMI for providing the opportunity to conduct this study An earlier draft of this paper was edited by Dr V Smakhtin and reviewed by Dr H Turrel, both of IWMI, Colombo, Sri Lanka Shahid Ahmad; Zahid Hussain; Asaf Sarwar Qureshi; Rashida Majeed; Mohammad Saleem 2004 Drought mitigation in Pakistan: Current status and options for future strategies Working Paper 85 Colombo, Sri Lanka: International Water Management Institute / drought / water harvesting / water conservation / institutions / policy / agriculture / technology / water resources / crop production / livestock / dams / wells / political aspects / health / groundwater / irrigation / water availability / Pakistan / ISBN 92-9090-580-8 Copyright © 2004, by IWMI All rights reserved Please direct inquiries and comments to: iwmi@cgiarorg ii Contents Executive Summary v Introduction 1 Target Areas 2 Droughts and Their Impacts in Pakistan 5 Water Harvesting and Conservation 13 Current Institutions and Policies for Drought Mitigation 27 Gaps in Drought Mitigation 35 Options for Future Strategy 38 Conclusions and Recommendations 42 Literature Cited 45 iii Executive Summary Droughts are typical in Pakistan as in most of southwest Asia and continue causing multiple adverse impacts This study is a part of the Regional Project on Drought Assessment and Potential for Mitigation in Southwest Asia, which is being implemented by IWMI in collaboration with regional partners and which is aimed to review the current status of drought-related issues and measures in Pakistan This paper reviews factors affecting, or associated with, droughts, focusing on the target areas (Baluchistan and Sindh provinces), identifying gaps in the institutional and policy arenas with recommendations for remedial measures, providing analyses of coping strategies adopted by stakeholders in mitigating droughts, and documenting lessons gained during previous drought cycles Pakistan frequently experiences several droughts The Punjab province experienced the worst droughts in 1899, 1920 and 1935 The North-West Frontier Province (NWFP) experienced the worst droughts in 1902 and 1951, while Sindh had its worst droughts in 1871, 1881, 1899, 1931, 1947 and 1999 The most severe droughts at the national scale were perhaps the most recent, which occurred in 19992000 prolonging up to 2002 The rainfall is erratic and river flows have dropped Water in the Tarbela dam reaches the dead level in late February or early March almost every year The current live reservoir capacity in the Indus basin has been reduced due to siltation The recent drought has also exposed the vulnerability of the Indus basin irrigation system and environmental issues in deltaic areas Agricultural growth suffered a severe setback during 20002001 as a result of drought While major crops registered a negative growth of almost 10%, the overall agriculture recorded a negative growth of 26% The drought persisted throughout 20012002, resulting in water shortage of up to 51% of normal supplies as against 40% of the previous year The total flows of water in major rivers also declined to 109 billion m3 against an average of 162 billion m3 Rainfall has also been below normal The canal head withdrawals have also witnessed significant decline Notwithstanding severe water shortages, the farmers in Pakistan undertook various measures to minimize their adverse effects These include judicious use of water, exploitation of groundwater, purchase of water from tube wells, improvements in cultural practices, and better overall management As a result, overall agriculture registered a positive growth of 14% in 20012002 as against a decline of 26% during 20002001 Droughts have also affected the performance of nonagriculture sectors Pakistans nonagricultural GDP growth remained stable at around 43% in 20012002 Therefore, when adjusted for drought impact, the real GDP is provisionally estimated to grow by 47% against 52% in 20002001 The slower growth in real GDP over these 2 years was caused by drought If there had been no drought, Pakistans economic growth would have been 5% Water harvesting, management and use are common practices for drinking or farming either directly harvesting the runoff or by storing it in small surface and subsurface reservoirs The stored water is used for supplemental irrigation and other consumptive uses In nonirrigated areas, the majority of farmers are still practicing traditional water-harvesting systems, sailaba or spate irrigation and khushkhaba or runoff farming These harvesting systems were adversely affected by the introduction of new technological interventions (like deep tube wells) and by recurring droughts The descriptive information on traditional and new technological interventions is available, but there is a complete gap of quantitative knowledge on how the new technologies have affected the traditional and sustainable interventions like karezes There is hardly any information available regarding the impact of new technologies on lowering of the water table and mining of groundwater in Baluchistan Similar impacts were observed in the arid zones of the Sindh province, where indiscriminate use of groundwater using deep tube wells led to drying up of the shallow dug-wells v and intrusion of saline water There is a unique opportunity in Baluchistan to document the impacts of deep tube-well technology on the drying of karezes, resulting in shifting the benefits of electricity tariff subsidy to the resource-rich farmers Baluchistan provides a unique opportunity to the Region in the assessment of the impacts of new technologies on the karez system A comprehensive research study is needed to address this issue in a scientific manner The institutional arrangements are reasonably well defined for the drought-relief activities, but there is hardly any institutional mechanism for drought preparedness and mitigation to address the long-term issues The strategy for technological development in Baluchistan and arid areas of Sindh should be based on the assessment of the potential resources available for development through integrating activities of spate irrigation with the objective of spreading of floodwater to increase the command area and recharging the regional groundwater resources The study conclusions and recommendations are: • The existing system of monitoring drought and its impacts on various sectors is weak There is a need to develop a policy for access to information related to drought and water management Such information databases themselves are limited at present A similar situation exists at the regional level Sharing and exchange of information regarding drought monitoring and impact assessment are also limited among the countries of the region India is ahead in this regard and Pakistan can learn from the Indian experiences Similarly, exchange of information and building joint programs between Pakistan and Iran would help the two countries • Farmers are not aware of actual crop water requirements, and irrigation-scheduling practices are still largely based on the amount of water available with the farmer and the situation of the farm Farmers tend to overirrigate to cover the unleveled fields Efforts are needed to help farmers in efficient conveyance and application of pumped groundwater The water- management technologies developed in the Indus basin regarding conveyance and application of water at the farm