Reservoirs in Pakistan are drying up, temperatures are soaring and there is little chance of significant rain for at least the next few months, a top weather official said on Monday.

In some areas, taps have already run dry and people are worried about whether they will find enough water for their families. "As I wake up, the first thing I worry about is getting water. I have to fetch water from other streets as the water tap in my street has dried up," Mohammad Zafar, a resident of Tench Bhatta, a low-income neighbourhood in Rawalpindi, said.

The wilting heat is adding to the nation`s misery. In Turbat, a town in Baluchistan, temperatures reached 48 degrees Celsius (118 Fahrenheit) on Monday. Pakistan, a country of 150 million people, relies heavily on winter rains and snow in the northern mountains to fill rivers and reservoirs to stock up for the long, hot dry months ahead of the July-September monsoon. "There is a likelihood of a severe water shortage in the coming months because of this drought," Qamar-uz-Zaman Chaudhry, Director-General of the Meteorological Department, told Reuters.

He said the country received 40 percent less than normal winter rains and up to 25 percent less snowfall. Water levels in major reservoirs were now critically low, he said. Rawal Lake, the main source of water supply to Rawalpindi, a city of nearly two million people, has largely dried up.

Drought conditions already prevailed in the southwestern province of Baluchistan and neighbouring Sindh province, and Chaudhry expected other parts of Pakistan to be affected. A severe drought between 1999 and 2002 affected Pakistan and parts of Afghanistan and India.

Agriculture accounts for 24 percent of Pakistan`s gross domestic product and employs about 42 percent of its labour force. "Right now, the situation is not very bad and the adverse impact of the drought could be minimised through proper planning," Chaudhry said. "At this stage, we don`t foresee any major impact on our agriculture sector ... but the situation could get out of hand if we don`t handle it properly," he added.

Chaudhry said the next crop up for sowing in Pakistan is cotton, which does not require as much water as others. "We can save water for other crops by properly using it for cotton," he added. Apart from rainfall, Pakistan relies on irrigation water from two huge reservoirs, the Tarbela and Mangla dams. As of May 8, the water level at Tarbela Dam, 50 km (30 miles) north of Islamabad in the North West Frontier Province, was just 20 feet (6 metres) above the point where water cannot be discharged. The level of water at the Mangla Dam, Pakistan`s second-largest, about 85 km (53 miles) southeast of Islamabad, was 74 feet (25 metres) above the cut-off point.

Chaudhry said the water level in Tarbela might improve due to snow melt in Pakistan`s northern mountains, but he was less optimistic for rainfed Mangla and other small reservoirs.
By Zeeshan Haider
(Planet Ark, 09/05/2006)