The Indus Magic: Flowing right from Lake Mansarovar (Tibetan plateau) , the Indus river runs a course through Ladakh district of Jammu and Kashmir and Northern Areas(Gilgit-Baltistan), flowing through the North in a southerly direction along the entire length of the country, to merge into the Arabian Sea near Pakistan's port city Karachi. The total length of the river is 3,180 kilometres (1,976 miles). Link Photo by Agha Waseem Ahmed.
"We must not confuse the Pakistani people with the Pakistan government. The government was playing politics with a crisis. The starving have no time for cynicism. The true victims of any such calamity are the poor, for the rich live above water. No poll has indicated that Pakistan’s flood-displaced would rather go hungry and roofless than eat wheat or take shelter under a tent purchased with India’s dollars." Mobashar Jawed Akbar
WaterWars in Pakistan: the perfect storm... a battle between indigenous cultural practices and the modernization which accompanies globalization; between partitioned nation states and shared rights to a precious natural resource; between privatization, deregulation and government oversight and corruption. Between a people, recognized as one of the third most water-threated populations in the world and xtreme weather.
And yes, A river runs through it ...
The Indus River (Sanskrit सिन्धु Sindhu,; Urdu: سندھ Sindh; Sindhi: سندھو Sindhu; Punjabi سندھ Sindh; Hindko سندھ Sindh; Avestan: حندو Harahauvati; Pashto: ّآباسن Abasin "Father of Rivers"; Persian: Nilou (رود سند) "Hindu"; Arabic: السند "Al-Sind"; Tibetan: Sênggê Zangbo (སེང་གེ།་གཙང་པོ&
#3851;) "Lion River"; Chinese: 森格藏布/狮泉河/印度河, Sēngé Zàngbù/Shīquán Hé/Yìndù Hé; Greek: Ινδός Indos;Turki: Nilab) is the longest river in Pakistan and the twenty-first largest river in the world in terms of annual flow. It is often considered the life-line of Pakistan. The Europeans used the name "India" for the entire South Asian subcontinent based on Indos, the Greek appellation of this river. Historically significant, the river is at the crux of the ancient Indus Valley Civilization.
Originating in the Tibetan plateau in the vicinity of Lake Mansarovar in Tibet Autonomous Region, the National River runs a course through the Ladakh district of Jammu and Kashmir and then enters Northern Areas (Gilgit-Baltistan), flowing through the North in a southerly direction along the entire length of the country, to merge into the Arabian Sea near Pakistan's port city of Karachi in Sindh. The total length of the river is 3,180 kilometers (1,976 miles). The river has a total drainage area exceeding 1,165,000 square kilometers (450,000 square miles). The river's estimated annual flow stands at around 207 cubic kilometers. Beginning at the heights of the world with glaciers, the river feeds the ecosystem of temperate forests, plains and arid countryside. Together with the rivers Chenab, Ravi, Sutlej, Jhelum, Beas and two tributaries from the North West Frontier and Afghanistan, the Indus forms the Sapta Sindhu (Seven Rivers) delta of Pakistan. Link Photo by Sarfraz Hayat
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Pakistan today is the current ground zero of the climate crisis as well as a key homing ground for natural resource wars which pit nation against nation, rich against poor, and ancient methods of agriculture and irrigation vs. modernization and sustainable method of highly localized and resilient development.
Ironic, that Pakistan, considered one of the top three (Pakisan, South Africa and Egypt) water-limited nations among the world's 25 most populous countries, is drowning as the banks of the drought-threatened Indus overflow, obliterating centuries of ancient agricultural systems. Systems which are currently being introduced in developing countries around the world to combat upcoming devastating droughts. Droughts which 99% of the world's scientists attribute to global warming.
Also ironic, that the Punjab region, now most devastated by the floods, is the center of the storm for AFPAC operations, recognized as the training ground for extremest elements in the region.
Somehow, the coincidences, the synchronicities, are mind boggling. At least to me.
Nation vs Nation
The origin of Pakistan's water war with India traces back to 1947, when both India and Pakistan were birthed, carved from the partitioning of the British Indian Empire. At the time, India was given control over that section of Kashmir where the six rivers of the region flow. This water, however, was integral for the irrigatation of the Punjab province.
In 1960, Pakistan was granted control over three of the rivers – the Indus, Jhelum and Chenab; and India – the Sutlej, Beas and Ravi. India, however, was entitled to limited use of Pakistan's rivers, for agricultural purposes and to build hydroelectric damns. Under the agreement, they were prohibited from diverting huge amounts of water. Yet, while population growth, climate change and a crumbling infrastructure are widely sourced as the reasons for Pakistan's growing water shortages, Pakistanis have long suspected India of diverting more than its fair allotment from their rivers.
But, according to Michael Kugelman, programme associate for South Asia at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars in Washington, DC., Pakistan’s water stress would be greatly alleviated by repairing and maintaining the country’s leaky canal system, a project which water expert Simi Kamal suggests would result in 10 times more water that the quantity expected to be generated by the Diamer-Bhasha dam.
A French chateau and starving Pakistan
Journalist Mobashar Jawed (MJ) Akbar draws parallels between the negligent response of Pakistan's leader Asif Zardari to today's devastating floods and the 1971 creation of Bangladesh, when Yahya Khan neglected Eastern Pakistan following Cyclone Bhola.
"There is already sufficient information from the ground to indicate that Pakistanis are at least as angry with Zardari as Bengalis were with Yahya Khan," he writes. Akbar suggests that the Pakistan Army's response to the disaster is casting them in a favorable light, chides Zardari for initially turning down India's offer of monetary assistance and questions if Zardari’s "fear of Indian money directly related to his fear of the Pakistan Army?" link
Its chief Ashfaq Kayani mobilised his troops for relief instantly. Zardari, in a display of astonishing, callous indifference, preferred to go on what can only be described as a working holiday in France and Britain, wherein the holiday invited more publicity than the work. The Army also donated, very quickly, a day’s pay, a thought that did not immediately occur to legislators. Zardari, in sharp contrast, breezed through his expensive jaunt, spending $12,000 per night for his suite in London, and zooming off, with his children and his nominated heir to the Bhutto throne, on helicopters to his chateau in France. A Zardari spokesman explained that this chateau had been in the family possession for 18 years. That then would be around the time when the Bhuttos were in power in Islamabad. Two plus two in Islamabad equals a chateau in France and a lordly estate in England.
Hope: The farmer is preparing his area for farming, they do farming once a year on the rain. Photo at : Thar Desert, Nagar parker, sindh, Pakistan. By Iqbal Khatri
Waragandi & Rich v Poor
In Pakistan, a 'waragandi rotation system' designed to ensure the equitable allocations of irrigation water among rural farmers -- while currently, 2/3 of Pakistan's population resides in rural areas, that number is projected to decrease dramatically by 2025, when 1/2 of the nation's population is expected to reside in urban areas -- is consistently abused by rich, highly political rural landowners. This unequal access to landownership and water rights is further complicated by the government's decision to sell and/or lease large amounts of farmland to outside investors:
Pakistan is going ahead with its plan to sell or lease out one million acres or 404, 700 hectares of its fertile farmland to foreign investors. Saudi Arabia seems to have shown its keen interest to acquire at least 0.7 million acres of farmland in Pakistan to grow food crops to ensure food security back home. Some Saudi investors are currently surveying Pakistan to identify suitable farmland that they can buy or acquire on lease. Foreigners Eying Farmland in Pakistan
Ancient vs. Modern
In the early 1990s, former President Pervez Musharraf began the process of privatization and deregulation to attract private-sector development. Modernization of the countries ancient spate agricultural systems was part of this process.
Simple infrastructure development can help people to manage flash floods and spread water over land - the working procedure of "spate irrigation". Published in LEISA Magazine, March 2009, vol. 25 no 1: Farming diversity.Link
Pakistan has dedicated more acreage to spate irrigation than any other country in the world. An ancient, complex resource management system, spate irrigation captures the water from spates -- sudden floods -- and uses 'wadis' -- rivers and streams -- to dispatch flood runoff into plains or potential farmland.
Under traditional irrigation practices applied by farmers, earthen structures are built across the whole width of the river at a suitable location to control and check and then divert water on both sides of river to the upstream fields. Upon sufficient water spreading in the upstream fields, the structure is deliberately breached in order to pass water to downstream areas
(snip)
After the land is inundated, crops are sown – sometimes immediately, but often the moisture is stored in the soil profile and used later. Spate irrigation systems support farming systems – usually cereals and oilseed, but also cotton, pulses and even vegetables.
According to an IFAD report, a second significant characteristic of sedimentation is that when rivers are in a state of spate lift, huge quantities of sediment are deposited, resulting in consistently changing bed levels. Because this occurs in both the river system itself and in the complicated distribution networks, conventional irrigation modernization approaches are inappropriate. Link
A review of interventions and modernization to spate irrigation systems in Balochistan (Pakistan) indicated that 65 per cent of the modernized systems were no longer functioning. Link "... the use of modern interventions and equipment was not appropriate for these natural systems. In many cases, these interventions were inappropriate: they suffered from heavy sedimentation, were not able to handle flood flows, disturbed local water distribution rules, or simply failed."
How much did the failure of these modernized spate systems contribute to the flooding? How much did the stalled jet stream contribute? The deforestation? The one degree rise in global temperatures? A weather pattern that caused four months of rain to fall in just a few days? A crumbling infrastructure? A corrupt government?
All ingredients for the makings of a perfect storm. And at the core of it all? A river running through it.
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Greg (Three Cups of Tea, Stones Into Schools) Mortnenson's non-profit (CAI) recommends supporting a local (Pakistani) group to which donations will likely have a large, immediate, and lasting impact-
Healing Development Foundation
http://www.hdf.com
(800) 705 1310
DONATE
• • • • • •
Other groups that deserve support as well.
Doctors without Borders (MSF):
DONATE
The Red Cross:
DONATE
OXFAM:
DONATE
UNICEF:
DONATE
Toll free: 1-800-FOR-KIDS (1-800-367-5437)
Text: "Text FLOODS to 864233 (UNICEF) to donate $10"
Shelterbox:
DONATE
ShelterBox tents in Shishkat upper Hunza, Pakistan
• • • • • •
From the US State dept.
How You Can Help:
Text "FLOOD" to 27722. Your $10 will go to the State Department Fund for Pakistan Relief that Secretary Clinton announced August 19, and is part of a new effort to bring attention to the need for aid.
Text "SWAT" to 50555 ; $10 goes to United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees fund for flood victims
Previously recommended relief diaries about the floods in Pakistan (with the Help Pakistan tag):
• Aug 21: Help-Pakistan!: Devastation
• Aug 20: Pakistan Floods - reporting/working from the inside
• Aug 20: Pakistan Relief: Just watch the video
• Aug 19: A slow moving Tsunami ....
• Aug 19: Anti-Muslim Bigotry: Not just for wingnuts anymore
• Aug 18: Pakistan Floods... Please Help
• Aug 18: Chaos is the new Normal {Earthship Wednesday}
• Aug 18: EcoAdvocates: A green model in the Gulf
• Aug 17: Please Help Pakistan... Please ... Update: New Flood Warnings
• Aug 16: pakistan III: the human face of climate change: ecojustice
• Aug 16: Pakistan still needs help; lots of it. Floods displace 20+ Million
• Aug 14: Pakistan: 6 Million Without Water (How to Help)
• Aug 9: Media ignores "Worst Humanitarian Disaster In Recent History"
• Jul 31: Pakistan needs help. Floods kill 800+, displace 1 Million
We are looking at what may be the worst humanitarian crisis the world has seen in a century.
Laughing Planet has started a Google group to address the crisis in Pakistan. Anyone who would like to get involved or get alerts when a new HELP PAKISTAN diary is posted, please join.
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