This is an important thought process of a rural person. Most people on this forum clearly are urban people, most who haven't had to live in a village. 62% of our population lives in these rural areas. Getting the viewpoint of the people from these rural areas is necessary when deciding to build dams. Rest of your post I can't agree or disagree with as I am not a professional in this matter nor have I ever taken agriculture as a subject. But it sounds like a thoughtful post.
Thank you for your kind words & understanding. See the most saddening part about this sorry tale is the lousy & apathetic nature of the farming community. It is astonishing to see & realise how expressionless farming communities are. See all the rural skilled ( barbers, coblers, carpenters ) communities found their voice in a post socialist world. Ordinary farmers were just lumped together with Jaagirdars. Farming is a labour intensive profession & for a small to medium sized farmer doesn't really hold much influence or glamour like an SHO, a doctor, a minor engineer or civil servant. This is where farmers were left behind by socialism.
I would disagree. Please read my note on this:
https://defence.pk/threads/water-scarcity-aging-canal-system-and-food-security.396511/#post-7619922
From the note you will see we have enough surface water to take care of irrigation and drinking water needs at present. If the old canal system if upgraded would mean we won't need to pump water from underground in order to cultivate crops. If we stop or reduce the pumping then the underground water table will slowly come back to normal. The aim would be to keep the underground water table at a sustainable levels.
Urbanization and industrialization would also require water management and more so then irrigation. In this scenario water gets used and a waste product comes out which will further contaminate underground/surface water unless we have water treatment plants etc. I wouldn't go into details but I could touch on the effects if you wish.
As per my earlier post. We need to upgrade the current storage and delivery system of water and alongside this we can modernize our agriculture practices. Rice and Sugar Cane can be cultivated but only in northern areas where water is abundant. I normally propose that the land lords should start by employing modern techniques to farming in order to bring some change to the sector. This way government can concentrate on storage and delivery of water in best way possible and farmers can use this water in best way possible.
I would disagree that upgrading the old canal system would put a stop to pulling water from underground. Even though we have the largest canal system in the world, canals do not & simply can not irrigate all the cultivatable area in a district like Sargodha, let alone the rest of Punjab & Pakistan. I have some land right at the river banks of the Chenab, some land about 10 miles from the river & some right in the middle of a seasonal river tributary which swells to a mile wide in July, August & then disappear altogether by October.
I do agree howeve that it may reduce the need to pull water from underground resources. But that is no guarantee that water wastage would diminish. Trust me a farmer is more likely to use water in a responsible manner if he is paying for the petrol or diesel costs of pulling it out from the ground than he is to use a communally used source like a canal, where he only pays a 1000 rupees every six months to Mehkma Aab pashi. I have a small tract of land in my ancestral village which is directly irrigated by a canal channel & trust me the abuse & theft of it is by no means worth the resource. There was no quantifiable way to record the water usage by any individual apart from a few ghost employees on the papers of mehkma aabpashi or the days of use allocated to an individual farmer which always resulted in disputes. We have long since bored the ground & put a small turbine engine to irrigate. If we let the rivers flow normally let's say how it was before 1947, with normal flooding pattern it will take more than 50 years to bring the water table back to the pre 1947 levels. Which is no way a feasible idea.
What we need is the Drip Feed system run on scientific basis, incentivised & subsidised by the government for the first 5 year period & then legislated as law & enforced with fines & punishments.
Reduction in water intensive crops by means of maximum quotas allowed for a season i.e, allow one division each in Punjab & Sindh to cultivate rice for a season, allowing for enough produce to cover our domestic needs & leave 5% as a surplus to sell internationally. Produce less, market a food commodity as a luxury item without actually incurring luxury items taxation like Italians do & earn more. Same again for other crops. All in all invest in agriculture, make farming fashionable & sophisticated, market BRAND INDUS.
I completely agree with your point about urbanisation & its effects ( of which all our major cities except Islamabad are glaring examples ). That's exactly why I believe it's easier & more feasible to invest in the second option mentioned above in my first comment.
