Kabul launches novel plan to address water crisis
Afghanistan's government has started building nearly 2 million trenches and 25 small dams to address a water crisis in the capital city of Kabul, caused by a booming population and wasteful consumption of the resource, officials told Arab News on Sunday.
“So far 25 small dams and 1.9 million ditches have been dug. Since the start of the work (project), 7.2 million cubic (meters) of water has been stored,” said Mohammed Mustafa Naveed, spokesman for the National Development Corporation (NDC), the government body tasked with urban projects.
More than 33,000 people have been employed for the initiative, which began in April this year and is expected to be completed in the next year and a half, he said.
“In the second phase of the project, 13 million saplings will be planted along these trenches, and thousands of more people will be employed to plant and preserve them,” Naveed said.
With an approximate population of 6 million people, Kabul's demand for water is far greater than its natural supply.
While Afghanistan is landlocked, several of its areas, including Kabul, are surrounded by mountains, a majority of which are covered by snow during the peak winter months.
However, short spells of rain and snowfall — coupled with the damaging effects of climate change — have meant that Kabul's water basin has been depleting rapidly,
forcing residents to dig deeper every year in search of the valuable resource.
When it does rain, most of the water ends up in sewers because almost all the streets and sidewalks of the city are asphalted.
This means only a limited amount of rain or snow water is absorbed by the earth, resulting in low groundwater levels.
Experts say this is just the tip of the iceberg as far as issues arising from climate change are concerned, while the NDC says its latest project could help to avoid a repeat of such events in the future.
“It will boost groundwater levels and increase greenery (which in time will help) to improve water and air quality,” Naveed said, adding that once the trenches are in place, “70 percent of the rainwater will get absorbed by the earth.” Previous governments have urged against water wastage, warning that the capital could run out of the natural, underground resource in 10 years if more is not done to address the problem.