Background and Context

Pakistan’s groundwater recourse not only acts as a valuable supplement to canal water for irrigation use in the Indus plains, but is also a leading source of water for domestic and industrial uses. The current upward trend of urbanization is expected to further expand demand for non-irrigation uses of this precious resource. Moreover, there is a growing dependence in agriculture on groundwater to mitigate risks of uncertain precipitation, erratic surface-water flows, water logging and persistent droughts, and to match water supplies to demands. These factors have spurred an exponential growth in groundwater abstraction, which started in the 1960s and continues until this date.

This excessive use of groundwater has not only resulted in a lower water table, buts has also created issues of groundwater quality. Tube wells have started up-coning the underlying saline groundwater in Southern Punjab and adjoining areas of Sindh. There is also the ongoing issue of salt water migration from saline areas underlined with fresh water, which is rapidly taking place in central Punjab, thus further diminishing groundwater quality in the area. the linked problem of diminishing quantity and deteriorating quality of groundwater reserves raise serious questions about the sustainability of the current system of groundwater use in Pakistan.

Policy Issues

• Plummeting water tables and unsustainable extraction of groundwater through tube wells. 
• Deteriorating quality of groundwater through up-coning of saline and brackish water and the interlinked issue of salt water migration.
• Absence of laws defining the right to groundwater use and delinking it from land rights.
• Inequitable access to groundwater between large landowners and small farmers.
• Groundwater pollution from fertilizers, chemicals, industrial waste and urban runoff.

Policy Action

• Development of a framework to differentiate agriculture and irrigation needs of fresh and saline groundwater areas.
• Introduction of groundwater markets as a mechanism to efficiently allocate groundwater resources.
• Improvement of recharge capability of groundwater by building storages to capture storm and rain water.
• Legislation to prevent the overuse of groundwater and define rights to groundwater usage
• Establish control over urban contamination of groundwater through better regulation of industrial waste, sewage and urban runoff.
• Development of a structure for the integrated use of surface and groundwater in areas where the water table is extremely low or the groundwater is saline.