Minister for Water Resources, Moonis Elahi in a written reply to a question has said that the federal government in the past three years has initiated work on more than 56 dam projects in the country.
This has been done in order to create sufficient water reservoirs in the country for power generation and for use in agricultural settings. Of the 56 projects 40 projects have already been completed, taking the storage capacity to 221,866 acre feet. The minister explained that the 16 ongoing projects/schemes are at various stages of implementation, which will further add storage of 964,049 acre feet.
The minister explained that the government is providing funds for construction of various small, medium and delay action/recharge dam projects in Balochistan through the Federal Public Sector Development Programme during the last three years. He said that the projects are aimed at providing water for irrigation/agriculture, and drinking purposes, adding the projects are being implemented by the Irrigation Department, Public Health Engineering Department, and the Water and Power Development Authority (Wapda).
