CIAO DATE: 02/2011
November 2010
Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource Centre
Pakistan faces a multidimensional water crisis that claims hundreds of thousands of lives every year. The root causes of the crisis are twofold: * circumstantial, which are linked to poor water-resource management policies (including water-wasting flood irrigation) * structural, tied to factors deeply ingrained in politics and society such as the obsession with India, inequitable rural land-ownership and endemic water misgovernance (for example, exploitation of the rotational irrigation system to the detriment of the poor). To resolve the crisis, both types of cause will need to be tackled, and the international community can play an invaluable role.
Resource link: International responses to Pakistan's water crisis: opportunities and challenges [PDF] - 793K