PHOTO: FAZAL KHALIQ/ FILE
According to a statement issued by the K-P CM House on Monday, K-P Secretary Irrigation Tariq Rashid and CGGC Deputy Manager Liu Yang signed the agreement. Chief Minister Pervez Khattak also attended the ceremony.
Water storage capacity of big dams goes down
The CRBC is a lift-cum-gravity irrigation canal project through which water level will be raised using pumping stations to irrigate about 280,000 hectares in DI Khan.
The officials, privy to the development, said that the K-P government had been desperately trying to include the project in the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) and for the purpose a summary had been sent to the Ministry of Planning, Development and Reforms.
The officials further said that the K-P Irrigation Department had prepared the project’s revised PC-1 in 2016 with an estimated cost of Rs119 billion.
Although the project had been pending, the PC-1 was approved by the Provincial Development Working Party (PDWP) in 2016 and sent to the Central Development Working Party (CDWP).
The federal government had placed the project under the Public Sector Development Programme, but the K-P government lacked financial resources to complete the project.
Only 76% of allocated funds spent on water projects
Last year, the K-P government and the federal government inked an agreement to share the project’s cost. The federal government would pay 65% and the K-P government would provide the rest (35%).
Then in April, the K-P government displayed the project at a road show in Beijing to attract investors. The success of the display can be gauged by the signing of the MoU.
Rashid, who inked the accord, told The Express Tribune that the MoU was signed with the CGGC last week on Thursday.
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