PIM in Pakistan: An Update

As noted in the second issue of this Newsletter, the Pakistan government is moving forward in implementing a more decentralized, financially independent, and participatory approach to irrigation and drainage management. A number of pilot projects are underway, and the government has already issued new legislation to support a thorough overhaul of the current institutional arrangements. 

From PID'sTo PIDA's

Management of the secondary irrigation system of Indus system is mainly operated and maintained by the four Provincial Irrigation Departments (PIDs). These have been transformed into corporate bodies known as Provincial Irrigation and Drainage Authorities (PIDAs) by provincial ordinances promulgated in January 1997. These new authorities will have greater autonomy from the provincial governments, as well as greater accountability to the irrigation users.

This institutional breakthrough in the irrigation and drainage network is a step forward towards implementation of a National Drainage Program (NDP), being launched by the government of Pakistan at a total worth of US$785 million, with the financial assistance of World Bank(IDA/IBRD), Asian Development Bank (ADB), and the Overseas Economic Corporation Fund (OECF) of the government of Japan.

• The institutional focus of NDP is on the main institutional stakeholders in the water sector, i.e.:
• Water Wing of the Water and Power Development Authority (WAPDA­W)
• Provincial Irrigation Departments (PIDs)
• On Farm Water Management Wings of the Provincial Agriculture Departments (PAD-OFWM's)
• Drainage research institutions
• Farmers
• NGOs
• The private sector

Self-accounting Area Water Boards are being established initially on a pilot basis in each province. Below these Area Water Boards, fully autonomous Farmers Organizations (FO's), owned and controlled by farmers, would be established at the distributary or minor level, typically covering 10,000 ha and perhaps 2000 farmers. The FO's would eventually take over investment and operation of distributaries, minors, fresh groundwater tube-wells, drains, on farm tile drains, and off-farm sub-drains which fall below the jurisdictions of the Area Water Boards. All FO's would employ professional managers (at least one each for Operations, Finance & Administration, and Social Mobilization) to run the irrigation and drainage system.

Privatizing Tube Wells

Expansion of the irrigation system of the Indus Basin without adequate drainage facilities has led to widespread waterlogging and salinity, threatening the agricultural potential of irrigated areas. By the 1950's, large areas in the Indus Basin became waterlogged and soil salinity increased, adversely affecting productivity of fertile lands. To control the ``twin menace" of waterlogging and salinity, the government of Pakistan embarked on a series of Salinity Control and Reclamation Projects (SCARPs)in the late 1950s.

The project aimed at lowering the groundwater table by providing ``vertical drainage"through large capacity, deep tubewells. Under SCARP's, about 13,500 publicly owned and operated tubewells were installed. In areas underlain by fresh groundwater, water from SCARP tubewells (STWs) was used to supplement canal supplies.

While the SCARP's have generally been successful in meeting their objective of maintaining the groundwater table at appropriate levels and providing a supplementary source of irrigation for conjunctive use with canal supplies, their performance has declined over time, and the fiscal burden on government has become unsustainable. As the performance of the SCARP's has declined, many farmers have installed low cost private tubewells which are generally much better maintained than the public tubewells. To date over 350,000 privatetubewells have been installed.

Since 1980, government policy has been to replace the large public tubewells with smaller, private tubewells; however, farmers have no direc tinterest in installing tubewells in areas where groundwater is too salty for irrigation. Therefore the government decided to retain the responsibility for installing new tubewells or tile drainage, as well as operating and maintaining existing tubewells for provision of subsurface drainage relief in waterlogged saline groundwater areas. 

This policy was reiterated in the Sixth Five-Year Plan, and in 1986, a SCARP Transition Pilot Project was initiated with the assistance of the World Bank to phase out and replace some 213 public tubewells with about 1,500 small capacity private tubewells in the province of Punjab. Encouraged by the success of this project, a second SCARP Transition project, implemented from 1992, is continuing the work, but with one notable difference. Instead of encouraging new single-owner private tubewells, the project is focusing on the transfer of existing public tubewells to joint ownership by the local community. 

There has been overwhelmingly positive response from farmers and provinces to this new approach, which uses social organizers to help farmers establish Farmer Organizations (FO's) around tubewells transferred to farmers. So far, over1,500 and 70 village-level FO's have been established in the provinces of Punjab and Sindh, respectively, around tubewells which are being transitioned from the provincial government to farmers. 

The forthcoming World Bank assisted Punjab Private Sector Groundwater Development Project (PPSGWD) envisages transferring all public SCARP tubewells (6,300) in fresh groundwater areas of the project to the private sector. The specific objectives of the project are to:

• Redefine government's role in groundwater development with a greater role for theprivate sector.
• Develop a regulatory framework and a monitoring program to ensure sustainable use of the groundwater resources.
• Develop sustainable farmers organizations which can efficiently operate and maintain groundwater irrigation, improve surface irrigation, and establish a base for participation in the management of the canal systems.
• Rationalize public expenditure on O&M of the irrigation and drainage systems as well as increase the recovery of public expenditures on irrigation infrastructure.
• Avoid the environmental hazard of saline water intrusion into fresh groundwater aquifers.
•  
• The Transition to PIM
• The On Farm Water Management (OFWM) program, which initially focused on formalizing the existing informal groups of water users at the tertiary (chak) level, is now expanding its mission to promote a new legal of farmer organization at the minor or distributary level under the Participatory Irrigation Management (PIM) concept. 
• The next phase of OFWM (Phase-IV) will focus on policy and instructional reforms including:
• Enhanced role of beneficiary groups, private sector and NGOs in planning,construction, and O&M
• Measures to improve funding and recovery of O&M as well as capital costs of the project

Ongoing implementation of pilot Participatory Irrigation Management models will provide a foundation for institutionalizing Farmer's Organizations for sharing their due role in operation, maintenance, and management of irrigation and drainage systems in Pakistan.

- Mushtaq Gill, Pakistan

Mushtaq Gill
Director General Agriculture
21-Davis Road
Lahore, Pakistan
Fax: (94-42)-636-6156.