Presented 16 March 2005 - 08:49 PM Go-Musharraf-Go: With his resignation all hopes of Pakistani nations for his power vision 2025 has also gone with him and we are in the age of darkness. Vision 2025’ is the biggest development scheme in Pakistan’s history The Water and Power Development Authority’s "Vision 2025" programme is aimed at developing 65 million acre feet (MAF) of additional water storage capacity in the Indus Basin and adding 27,000 megawatts (MW) of hydro and thermal electricity-generation capacity to the national grid to meet the country’s growing water and power needs. At current prices, the cost of the Vision 2025 programme is estimated at $ 45 billion, making it the biggest development scheme in Pakistan’s history. Several international lending agencies, including the World Bank and the Asian Development Bank have shown interest in co-financing the programme. Financing for it has also been discussed with China, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and several other countries. Meanwhile, work has begun on a number of Vision 2025 projects, with funding from the government and Wapda’s own resources. The projects include Gomal Zam Dam in NWFP, Mirani Dam in Balochistan, and the raising of Mangla Dam’s height by 40 feet to increase its hydroelectric generation capacity and make up for the loss in reservoir storage capacity due to siltation in the 35 years since the dam was built. Under Phase I of the three-phase Vision 2025 programme, Wapda has been given the go-ahead to undertake detailed engineering and feasibility studies for Basha Dam and the Greater Thal Canal, as well as for Kachi Canal in Balochistan, the Chashma Right Bank Canal in NWFP, the Thal reservoir project in Punjab, and three projects in Sindh: Riverine Area Development, Thar Canal and Sehwan Barrage. The total cost of these projects is estimated at $ 10.79 billion. Priority hydroelectric generation projects in Phase I include: Jinnah ($ 162 million), Malakand-III ($ 80 million), Allai Khawar ($ 110 million), Golen Gol ($104 million), New Bong ($110 million), Khan Khawar ($ 86 million), and Duber Khawar ($ 109 million). Hydroelectric projects to be built under Phase II (approved by the government in January 2001) include: raising the height of Mangla Dam ($ 850 million), Doyian ($ 346 million), Neelum-Jhelum ($ 1.5 billion), Kohala ($ 1.4 billion), Matiltan ($ 110 million), Gulpur ($ 150 million), Abbasian ($ 250 million), Rajdhani ($ 113 million), and several combined cycle power generation projects ($ 2.9 billion). Phase III (also approved in January 2001) consists of 16 schemes, including dams and generation projects (hydro and thermal): Basha Dam ($ 6 billion), Dasu ($ 3.1 billion), Patan ($ 2.97 billion), Thakot ($ 2.56 billion), Bunji ($ 2.69 billion), Munda ($ 1.56 billion), Chakothi ($ 167 million), Naran ($ 262 million), Suki Kinar ($ 750 million), Patrind ($ 160 million), Azad Pattan ($ 266 million), Karot ($ 252 million), Thar Coal project ($ 1.6 billion), Lakhra Coal project ($ 360 million), and several combined cycle power generation projects ($ 1 billion). Meeting Pakistan’s growing water and electricity needs is crucial for its future development. The water issue, in particular, has long been a thorny one, with the provinces continuing to squabble over the sharing of Indus waters. The provinces are also divided over the issue of the controversial Kalabagh Dam. Punjab is strongly in favour of building the it. The federal government, too, now seems to favour building it. But NWFP and Singh are bitterly opposed to it, saying the dam would submerge thousands of acres of fertile land in NWFP’s Mardan district and deprive Sindh of some of its fair share of Indus water. These conflicting views underscore the need for the federal government and the provincial governments to take a long-term perspective on Indus Basin management and what Professor James Wescoat, Jr., Department of Geography, University of Colorado at Boulder (USA), one of the world’s leading experts on water issues, and two colleagues of his - Sarah J. Halvorson, Department of Geography, University of Montana, Missoula (USA), and Daanish Mustafa, Department of Geography, University of Colorado at Boulder - have described as "articulated adaptive management" in a monograph published in 2000 under the title "Water Management in the Indus Basin of Pakistan: A Half-century Perspective". As the monograph’s authors note, previous reviews of water management (such as Wapda’s in 1990) have not developed a half-century perspective that has relevance for future planning. The authors note that the "Pakistan Country Report: Vision for Water for the 21st Century" (Pakistan Water Partnership, 1999) "lays out a bold plan for progressive transformation of water resources governance, economics and environmental quality." So what insights does a 50-year perspective yield that could help achieve those aims? The monograph sketches out some answers to this question. "Taken together these answers constitute a framework for managing complex water systems that we call Articulated Adaptive Management (AAM)," says the monograph. The half-century perspective developed in the paper on the Indus basin development suggests five main principles. First, plan for crises. Few plans explicity acknowledge the possibility, let alone likelihood of economic, political and environmental crises. In the field of adaptive management, these are called "surprises that test the resilience of ecosystems, livelihoods and management institutions." A 50-year perspective on the Indus Basin highlights such crises and changes in the basic assumptions and aims of water management. It sheds light on the frequency, consequences and efficacy of alternative responses to crises. It also reveals how and when crises can stimulate innovation. Second, plan for multiple strategies to achieve governance goals. "The Vision for Water in the 21st Century" underscores the importance of good governance. The past half-century of experience sheds light on both the inertia of historical institutions and the dynamic changes that occur during periods of political change. These changes in governance are related, in ways that are not fully understood or discussed, to adjustments in surface and groundwater irrigation; systems performance; and environmental quality. They suggest a three-pronged strategy of: (a) incremental reform for periods of stable governance; (b) episodic breakthroughs for periods of stronf local participation and political leadership; and © risk management for periods of political instability. Third, plan at multiple geographic scales of water management. The vision of the mid-century was integrated river basin management at the national scale. That vision partially displaced an earlier pattern of provincial control, and it was succeeded by an increasing emphasis on command area, community and household scales. A 50-year perspective also indicates major changes in multilateral and bilateral water programmes. These changing inter-governmental relations and linkages are rarely managed well, which underscores the importance of articulating water management programmes at multiple geographic scales, from the household to international levels of political economy, and from the farm plot to landscape and bioregional scales of ecosystem management. Fourth, plan to support varied patterns of regional water management and innovation. Agro-economic models recognise that different crops require different irrigation management regimes, but this principle receives less support in regional and national water planning where "one size" is often expected to "fit all". Articulating a range of regional approaches, and linkages among them, requires flexibility and an ability to translate concepts and methods across different water management cultures. The 50-year perspective reveals a range of water management approaches across the provinces, districts and agro-economic zones of Pakistan. It reminds us that regions once regarded as "marginal" can become sources of innovation, precisely because they lie outside the main system and can therefore become sites of experimentation. Fifth, plan for scientific and social experimentation with water and environmental management alternatives. The past half-century of experience in the Indus basin indicates that the main system has been an important ‘laboratory’ for water management. While Pakistan has pioneered large-scale experimentation in the irrigation sector, it has not yet extended these experiments to embrace the full scope of ecosystem management, social learning and cultural values in water. An old adage popular in the American West says: "Water flows uphill - towards money!" But the approach to water management in an agrarian economy like Pakistan, with highly unequal levels of development between one part of the country and another, has to be different. Here, water management has to, above all, be based on the principle of equity and distributive justice.
Posted on: Sun, 21 Jul 2013 21:14:59 +0000
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