Chalk out water distribution estimate for crops, depts told

LAHORE:PUNJAB Finance Minister Hashim Jawan Bakht Thursday instructed the irrigation and agriculture departments to jointly chalk out water requirement estimates for crops in different districts of the province in order to evolve need-based water distribution formula.

Chairing Chief Minister Special Monitoring Unit meeting for quarterly progress of the irrigation department, he said that agriculture sector played pivotal role in economic revival of the country. He said preserving rainwater by constructing the small dams, stopping the irregular usage of water in farmhouses and canal water theft were the responsibilities of irrigation department.

The minister said that solving the farmers’ problems, reducing cost of production and making crops profitable in accordance with the areas were the government’s priorities. He said proper utilisation of water could help in irrigating barren lands which would gradually increase productivity. He instructed the secretary irrigation to utilise departmental resources for repairing and maintenance work of the canals. He stressed the need of research and development work besides provision of the experts’ opinion to the farmers for water utilisation.

Irrigation Minister Mohsin Laghari said that proper monitoring and implementation was crucial for the success of small dams and controlling the water theft. He said that installation of solar system on canals could provide electricity across the province. Mian Aslam Iqbal said that distribution of water was farmers’ major issue. He said that the department should utilise additional resources to facilitate the small farmers. Dr Salman Shah said that cabinet wanted to ensure water availability to the farmers and department should make long-term planning for it. The secretary irrigation briefed about the department’s progress and development work. He mentioned that Greater Thal Canal would be functional in June 2020, while proposed legislation for underground water use was presented in Assembly.

UNDP delegation: A delegation of Ministry of Climate Change and UNDP visited Punjab Information Technology Board (PITB) at Arfa Software Technology Park Lahore here on Thursday. The objective of the visit was to educate the selected representatives from GoP/UNDP's "Generating Global Environmental Benefits" programme regarding the integration of IT, environment, development, and thus enhance their commitment and capacity for playing an effective role in their domain of action.

The delegation led by Country Coordinator GEB, United Nations Development Programme Dr Saleem Janjua met with Chairman PITB, Azfar Manzoor. Director PITB Salman Amin gave an overview of various PITB projects to the participants. The session proceeded with presentations and discussions.