As the relations improve between United States and Pakistan; both the countries will discuss providing financial and technical assistance for the construction of mega water reservoirs, setting up National Water Commission, water regulator body and improvement in irrigation system at the water working group here on Wednesday.
An official source, at the one day water dialogue US delegation will be led by the Under Secretary of State for Democracy and Global Affairs Maria Otero, while Pakistan will be led by the Secretary Water and Power Imtiaz Kazi and will include Chairman of Water and Power Development Authority Shakil Durrani. The meeting will discuss national water supply and infrastructure, especially dams, storage and delivery systems and identify key areas where US government can provide technical assistance to facilitate progress on policy and regulatory reforms like glaciology, dam design and operations, remote sensing and high efficiency irrigation system.
The meeting will also review the government’s priorities on water, including the Bhasha Diamer Dam and the establishment of a National Water Commission. US had been stressing Pakistan’s need to draft a national water policy and strengthen the role of provinces in the projects and development of a national water policy and commission, as their ultimate implementation would be done at the provincial level. A coherent water policy is required to reduce inefficient water usage, improve cost recovery, increasing water storages, removing subsidies and improving water management systems. The source said provinces had objected on having a water regulatory body as they were of the opinion that Indus River System Authority was doing the job effectively.
However they supported setting up of a national water commission. Pakistan is seeking financial assistance for the Gomal Zam Dam, Kurram Tangi Dam, Satpara Dam and Bhasha Diamer Dam. Islamabad is confident that with assistance of ADB, it will be able to raise funds for the construction of the Basha Dam. However, it was still seeking a token investment of $10 million by the US government to get better risk insurance and involvement of other donors. Bhasha Diamer dam project would provide additional water storage capacity of 8 Million Acre Feet (MAF) and would also have power generation capacity of 19 billion KV.
But the most important feature of the dam would be flood mitigation as it could hold an enormous amount of water and would prevent overflow of floods to the rest of the Indus River system.
