1. Groundwater Management
in Pakistan
Dr. Asad Sarwar Qureshi
IWMI-Pakistan
GWP/IWMI Workshop on Climate Change, food
and water security, Feb. 24-25, Colombo

2. Why GW is so important?
Existing water usage in Pakistan (BCM)
Description of Uses
Rainfall
River Groundwater Harvesting
Total
Irrigated Agriculture 76.5 51.8 5.79 134.1
Domestic Water Supplies 2.59 4.19 0.37 7.15
& Sanitation
Industries 0.74 1.97 - 2.71
Total : 79.8 57.9 6.17 144
Over 1.2 million pumps, out of which 0.8 M are only in Punjab.
Increased yields by 150-200%. Cropping intensity increases
from 70% to 150%. Drought mitigation, Drinking water for
major cities. Major source for drinking water in urban areas.

3. Groundwater-poverty relationship
WET
Time Dimension
YEAR
S
Comfortable Relatively Safer
Zone Zone
Head Middle Tail Rain-fed
A Vulnerable
Relatively Safer Zone
Zone
GW-source for survival
DRY

4. Challenges of GW management
• Over-exploitation in many areas.
• Quality deterioration.
• Secondary salinization
• Non compliance of governing laws.

5. Imbalance in recharge-discharge
(Water table decline in 43 canal commands)
Punjab
Sindh
The situation in Balochistan is even worse. Sindh is
extracting less groundwater due to quality concerns

6. Depletion due to overdraft
Increased WT depths and pumping costs. Average WT decline in the IB
is 1.5 m/yr. About 5% area in Punjab and 15% in Balochistan has gone
out of reach of the poor.
1993 2003

7. Spatial and Temporal GW Quality
1977 2003
Fresh
Marginal
Hazardous
22% in Punjab and 78% area in Sindh has saline GW.

8. Soil salinization-still the biggest threat
One ton of salts per ha per year with surface water irrigation.
GW irrigation and Conjunctive water use is even adding more.

9. GW Governance: HOW?
• In addition to administrative problems, less respect for
law and political interference are major reasons.
• Failure of permit system (1980s).
• Non implementation of GW regulatory framework in
1990s (developed with the assistance of WB) due to
lack of political interest.
• Failure to enforce PIDA act of 1999-2000 due to
administrative and political complications.

10. GW management options for Pakistan
• Improve surface supplies-reduce system losses.
• Build storages to save water for dry periods.
• Energy-groundwater nexus??? May be not for Pakistan.
• Control demand to reduce dependence on GW.
• GW is complex in Pakistan—No single solution.

11. Climate change impacts….

12. Annual Flows to Sea
Drastic reduction-threat to coastal Environment

13. Increase storage capacity
(15% of the river flow; only enough for 30 days-
32% will be lost by 2025)
59% of the flow in the Indus comes
from rainfall and 85% is received in
during monsoon – storage must!!

14. Improve water allocation delivery and
distribution-reduce system losses
Description of Losses Annual System Losses (billion m3)
1975-80 1980-85 1985-90 1990-95
Canal Conveyance losses 27.4 27.3 26.9 27.0
Watercourse Conveyance Losses 41.3 41.1 40.4 40.7
Field Application Losses 15.5 15.4 15.2 15.3
Total Losses 84.2 83.8 82.5 83.0
Total Canal Diversions 130.7 130.0 128.0 128.8
Overall Irrigation Efficiency (%) 36 36 36 36
(Source: Ahmad, 2008)
• Less and unreliable canal water supplies
• Tail-end farmers get 20% less from middle
farmers and middle farmers get 20% less
than head farmers.

15. Electricity restrictions-not for PK
• Electric wells have reduced to 10% of the total. Use of
power supply as a tool for GW management is probably not
the answer.
• Cost of GW irrigation 30 times higher than that of surface
irrigation. US$ 5.5/ha/yr for canal and 167 US$/ha/yr.
• Cost of water from diesel tubewells (US ¢ 2.50/m3) is three
times higher than electric tubewells (US ¢ 0.80/m3).
• Farmer prefer diesel tubewells due to low initial installation
costs, suitability for small fragmented farms and no worry
of power cuts.
• Control demand

16. GW management options
• Rationalizing cropping patterns according to water
availability (rice, sugarcane areas can be reduced??).
• Improve productivity of rain-fed areas (rain-fed areas
contribute only 10% of total production; Yields are only
1-1.5 t/ha and can be doubled by better WM).
• Increasing use of alternate water resources
(wastewater, saline water) for agriculture (Pakistan
produces 4.5 BCM WW—mostly wasted).

17. Complex GW occurrence-complex solutions?
Fresh GW underline
by saline GW-
manage pumping
Fresh GW-overdraft-
control pumping
Shallow-saline
GW-Drainage

18. Thank you
Qureshi, A.S., P.G. McCornick, A. Sarwar and B. R. Sharma, 2010. Challenges and prospects
for sustainable groundwater management in the Indus Basin, Pakistan. Water Resources
Management, Vol. 24, No. 8:1551-1569.