Rivers a source of rising tension between Pakistan and India

A 1960 trans-boundary water sharing agreement between India and Pakistan has stood the test of two wars and various periods of unease. Climate change, however, may prove the toughest test of the Indus River deal, observers say. The two rival South Asian nations share the 190 billion cubic meters of Himalayan snowmelt that course through the Indus each year. The river originates from India's Himalayan Hindu Kush mountains and flows through Jammu and Kashmir and then through Pakistan to reach the Arabian Sea. But experts say that climate change could alter the timing and rate of snow melt, with an initial increase in annual runoff followed eventually by a steep decrease that will severely curb river flows.

CONFLICT OVER RIVERS?

That could provoke conflict between the two nations, particularly as India develops dams along the upper riches of the Indus, raising questions in Pakistan over whether falling water availability is due to climate change or to India's reservoirs. A 2009 World Bank report "South Asia: Shared views on Development and Climate Change," says the two South Asian monsoon-dependant agri-economies may be in for big upsets as a result of climate change. "Upstream or downstream, we (India and Pakistan) are in the same boat," said Hameed Ullah Jan Afridi, Pakistan's federal minister for environment, at a recent workshop in Islamabad on cross-border water scarcity and climate change. The tortuously negotiated 1960 water-sharing treaty owes its roots to the 1947 separation of India and Pakistan into separate countries. It gives India rights to the natural flow of water of the Indus' three eastern tributaries - the Ravi, Sutlej and Beas - while Pakistan controls the main Indus channel itself and two western rivers, the Jhelum and Chenab. But determining what amount of water constitutes a river's natural flow is growing more difficult as climate change affects glacial runoff and the monsoon. Pakistan has increasingly raised concerns about data sharing and transparency, particularly because the upper reaches of all of the rivers lie in Indian-controlled territory, giving that nation greater scope for control of the entire Indus river system.

LACK OF ALTERNATIVE SOURCES

Pakistan's anxieties stem in large part from its lack of alternative water resources. Seventy-seven percent of its population survives on water from the Indus basin. High levels of poverty and population density also render both countries particularly vulnerable to climate change-related water shortages, said Munawar Saeed Bhatti, of Pakistan's ministry of foreign affairs. The changes threaten to have a strong impact on agriculture in both nations as well. Changes in temperature and precipitation patterns will alter crop yields and growing seasons, and a predicted increase in more extreme storms, rainfall and drought could cut harvests, according to the U.N. Environmental Programme. Experts believe new pests and diseases also will emerge, and could contribute to seriously impacting food security in both nations. Pakistan's meteorological department has already recorded a 10 to15 percent decrease in winter and summer rainfall in the country's coastal belt and arid plains, with a temperature rise of 0.6 to 1.0 degree Celsius over historical levels, officials said. Per capita water availability in Pakistan has dropped in last 50 years from 5,600 cubic metres to 1,038 cubic meters today. By 2025 it is predicted to be 809 cubic meters, according to the Pakistan government's Water and Power Development Authority. Humid areas of Pakistan, meanwhile, have seen an 18 to 32 percent increase in monsoon rainfall. In India and Pakistan, 70 percent of rain falls during monsoon periods, which cover four months of the year.

TAKING ACTION

In Pakistan's western Himalayan foothills, where farmers rely on glacial melt from the Karakoram range and year-round rainfall, both water sources are now reducing. Fruit farmers in the area, such as 65-year-old Muhamud Riyaz, have already responded by harvesting summer stream water into 3,000 litre gravity-fed storage tanks. "When I was a boy, summer came but mounds of snow at the foot of thick foliage trees would sit there, melting slowly, keeping the soil moist until the summer rains came. Since the last two years, the snow is just a thin layer and it rains only in monsoons," Riyaz said. In other areas, flooding is the problem. Pakistan records floods almost every year now, and in India the area affecting by flooding more than doubled between 1953 and 2003, and currently represent about 11 percent of its geographic area, according to the World Bank. Even in areas that regularly flood, "high frequency, low intensity flood events have now turned into high intensity, high frequency floods," said Daanish Mustafa, a water specialist and geography professor at London's Kings College. River siltation is contributing to the problem, he said. The problems facing both sides of the India-Pakistan border are particularly bad because "water management is literally a little above Stone Age," said Richard Garstang, national programme manager of Pakistan's wetlands programme. Up to 30 percent of water is lost from the country's unlined irrigation canals, experts said. The country has some 16 million hectares of irrigated farmland, one of the largest contiguous irrigated areas in the world. Poor water management is to a great extent responsible for Pakistan's water woes, a 2006 World Bank report noted. It warned that ground water is being over exploited and 20 million tonnes of salt has accumulated in the water system.

AQUIFERS BEING DEPLETED

"Half a million vertical wells in the Indus basin are depleting aquifers faster than they can be replenished," Mustafa said. Agriculture accounts for half of total fresh water use in Pakistan. "Due to a combination of age and 'build/neglect/rebuild' philosophy of public works, much of the infrastructure is crumbling," the World Bank report said. Indian officials have attributed Pakistan's water woes in part to a dearth of water storage infrastructure, noting that a huge 38 million acre-feet of fresh water goes un-utilized into the Arabian Sea every year.

Manipadma Jena is a Reuters AlertNet correspondent and freelance development journalist based in Bhubaneswar, India

Source: Reuters AlertNet

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