LAHORE: Pakistan China Joint Chamber of Commerce (PCJCCI) on Monday suggested adopting the Chinese water purification model to reduce the spread of waterborne diseases that were causing an annual loss of up to $1.3 billion.
The suggestion was made at a meeting of the PCJCCI presided over by its President Moazzam Ghurki. Since the 2022 flooding, the spread of gastrointestinal infections had increased, further adding to the health costs of the government of Pakistan, the PCJCCI pointed out.
The purpose of the meeting was to discuss Chinese water management system and purification technology for the benefit of Pakistan. The replication of this system could overcome water diseases in Pakistan, particularly in poor cities of Sindh and Baluchistan that did not have access to clean drinking water.
Ghurki said Pakistan should install water filtration plants based on solar power permanently and manual mechanism based on the area needs and population capacity to handle the equipment. The solar based filter could purify 1,500 litres of floodwater per hour. However, the manual filter as compared to the solar based only had a PLP wheel and a handle attached to it for drawing water into the filters whereas the rest of the technology was the same.
PCJCCI Senior Vice President Fang Yulong said that China’s global freshwater sources were merely 6 percent whereas; they have to provide clean drinking water to 20 percent of the world’s population. However with years of research and exploration, China has devised a water purification system that not only enabled it to meet its water needs but also provided people with medically approved healthy water.
The water crisis is a global issue and now China wants to benefit the world, since Pakistan faces such a crisis particularly in Sindh and northern Punjab, it is important to introduce such plants to Pakistan. The PCJCCI believed that the country is in dire need of such a system.