ADB invests $73m in reducing water losses

This is part of phased upgrading of Punjab’s irrigation infrastructure.

ISLAMABAD: The Asian Development Bank will invest $73 million in rehabilitating Pakpattan Canal and Suleimanki Barrage in Punjab in an effort to reduce water losses.

“The rehabilitation of Pakpattan and its linked channels and installation of new gates at Suleimanki Barrage will reduce water losses and improve water delivery systems, benefitting about 2.6 million people in four farming districts,” said Werner Liepach, ADB’s Country Director for Pakistan, in a statement on Tuesday.

The Pakpattan Canal and Suleimanki Barrage Improvement Project is part of the phased upgrading of Punjab’s obsolete irrigation infrastructure and associated facilities.

An efficient irrigation system is vital to maintain agricultural output and competitiveness and this project aims to rehabilitate nearly century-old canals and barrages to ensure reliable water supply vital to boost incomes of farming families in the country’s breadbasket districts, said Liepach.

Annual water leakages through the damaged gates of Suleimanki Barrage exceed 267 million cubic metres and Pakpattan Canal and its structures are also badly damaged, resulting in disorder in regulating flows and high losses.

In Punjab, the most populous province of the country, irrigated farming accounts for 26% of its gross domestic product and employs over 40% of its labour force. The province’s 14 barrages supply water for irrigation though an elaborate network of 22 main and link canals.

The investment is part of the $900 million multi-tranche finance facility for the Punjab Irrigated Agriculture Investment Program approved by the ADB in 2006 to co-finance investment in the province’s irrigation sector.

The first two tranches were invested in improving Lower Bari Doab Canal, Balloki Barrage and New Khanki Barrage.

Published in The Express Tribune, May 1^st, 2013.

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