ISLAMABAD, Oct 27 (APP): Minister for Water Resources Syed Khursheed Ahmed Shah while underlining the importance of water on Thursday stressed the need for educating farmers to control the wastage of water during the irrigation process.
“There is a dire need to educate and train the farmers so unnecessary water wastage can be saved”, the minister said while talking to media persons here after inaugurating the technology showcasing exhibition in the pretext of ongoing Pakistan Water Week here.
He said water was more expensive than petrol and diesel in the rest of the world, but unfortunately, “We did not give so much importance and value to it in our country”. “Pakistan has around 150 million acre-feet (MAF) water, but can only store around 13 MAF and the rest goes to waste every year”, he added.
He was of the view, “Our farmers were mostly not educated and they did not know how to conserve and store water. Our current food basket was indebted to water”, he added.
He said Sukkur Barrage was built by the British government for irrigating system. K-IV and K-V projects have been approved to meet the water requirement of Karachi, he said.
He was of the view that if rationing of water was in-placed, 650 million gallon of water would be sufficient for Karachi. “Our population has been rapidly increasing which would ultimately also affect our food basket”, he said.
Khursheed said around 700 RO plants were set up in Thar for water treatment, but now nearly 100 were functioning.
He advised all the quarters concerned to showcase exhibitions in all agri universities of the country and educate the people about climate change and water issues.
He said Pakistan remained the victim of climate change and the world was giving us only token money.
Responding to a question, the minister said that efforts were being made to complete Diamer Basha dam and other such projects at the earliest.
Earlier, the minister inaugurated the exhibition and took around various stalls set up by various institutions.
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