Water crisis in KPK is nothing new. From local studies to international assessments, alarming situation of ensuing and pending water crisis in the province is prevalent. Pesahwar, Kohat, Mardan and Abbottabad are cities which have been facing drinking water crisis since long now. According to estimates, millions of KP citizen are at risk of severe water scarcity. To address this immediate crisis, caretaker government of KP has taken steps with the help of international community and donors like Asian Development Bank (ADB).
According to reports, The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Cities Improvement Project (KPCIP) would give millions of people in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa access to safe drinking water and a healthy environment.
During a meeting at the KPCIP office on July 14, 2023, the caretaker minister of the local government, elections, and rural development department, Advocate Sawal Nazir Khan, emphasized the transformative impact of the ongoing and prospective projects.
The provincial administration has been working on numerous projects in the five divisional headquarters of Peshawar, Mardan, Mingora, Abbottabad, and Kohat with financial support from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and Asian Investment and Infrastructure Bank. These initiatives seek to update municipal services and implement extensive enhancements for the local populace’s benefit including improving supply of drinking water.
According to the project briefing by officials, an integrated waste management system will be built in the cities, ensuring the collection, safe transportation, segregation, and scientific disposal of garbage in a sanitary landfill cell. The groundwater table and the ecology will not be harmed by this method.The projects will install flow meters and Supervisor Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems for the water supply.
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) authorized $385 million in financing for the KPCIP in December 2021. Through the development of clean water supply treatment facilities, sewerage treatment facilities, and the rehabilitation of defective tube wells, the project seeks to improve the livability and community health of the five cities.
More than 3.5 million people would profit from increased access to potable water, dependable waste disposal and sanitation services, green urban areas, and amenities that are gender-neutral.
Here is a very prudent question. Will KPCIP solve drinking water crisis in multiple cities of KP?
According to a study, the chemical and bacteriological analysis of water from different sources i.e., bore, wells, bottle, and tap, from Peshawar, Mardan, Swat and Kohat districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) province, Pakistan showed that majority of the water sources had unacceptable E. coli count i.e.> 34 CFU/100mL. E. coli positive samples were high in Mardan District, followed by Kohat, Swat and Peshawar district. Besides this, some water sources were also chemically contaminated by different inorganic fertilizers (nitrates/nitrites of sodium, potassium) but under safe levels whereas agricultural and industrial wastes (chloride and sulphate compounds) were in unsafe range. Among all districts, the water quality was found comparatively more deteriorated in Kohat and Mardan districts than Peshawar and Swat districts. Such chemically and bacteriologically unfit water sources for drinking can cause human health problems among masses.
Keeping these findings in the view, it is critical for KP government to adopt policies to ensure that not only water leakage will be addressed by replacing the outdated, rusty pipes with leak-proof supply lines but the issue of wastewater dumping in freshwater bodies will also be sorted.
According to government offcials, KPCIP’s main objective is to clean wastewater so that it can be used as irrigation or recycled back into water bodies, which will benefit both aquatic and terrestrial life. Question remains, if KP province has required infrastructure for such activities like cleaning wastewater or the investment required to build such infrastructure? The KPCIP also calls for redesigning and replacing the aging drainage infrastructure, which will greatly enhance stormwater management and reduce floods in the cities.
Unfortunately, there is no whole of government effort is there and KP alone can’t undertake a project of such scale. Another reason which makes whole of government approach inevitable in this case is the analysis of root causes of drinking water crisis in the province.
There are several causes of water scarcity in Pakistan, including urbanization and huge population growth. Experts have predicted that water capacity could reach to 1,000 cubic meters if Pakistan did nothing till 2035. Almost all the provinces of Pakistan have suffered from water scarcity especially Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP). Drinking water quality in Pakistan is decreasing gradually due to alarming population growth, rapid industrialization, climate change and lack of efficient water quality management. In Pakistan, the majority of the population doesn’t have access to safe and healthy drinking water sources, and people are forced to use unsafe drinking water.
KPCIP’s scope is limited when we analyze it in context of factors like expansion of cities, migration patterns and socio-economic deterioration due to constantly increasing inflation. Water crisis in Pakistan is a national emergency and efforts at federal level must be initiated at war footings to overcome this crisis. No matter how good KPCIP initiative is, its limited scope will not solve the ever-growing challenge of drinking water scarcity in a few of the largest cities in the province.
