Ahsan Iqbal calls for national consensus on water security

ISLAMABAD: The federal government on Wednesday urged the country to build a national consensus to move beyond managing recurring water crises and instead adopt a broader water security framework in light of emerging challenges, including what Planning Minister Ahsan Iqbal described as India’s weaponisation of water.

Speaking at a round table session of the newly formed Water Security Task Force at the Planning Commission, Iqbal said the proposed consensus should include strategic water storage through large reservoirs, medium and small dams, recharge dams, delay-action dams, hill torrent management, floodwater storage and urban rainwater harvesting.

He said Pakistan’s water challenge could no longer be handled in isolated sectors and described it as a matter of national security rather than only an irrigation, agriculture, provincial, infrastructure or climate issue.

"It is not merely an irrigation issue, an agricultural issue, a provincial issue, an infrastructure issue or a climate issue; it is a national security issue", the minister said.

Iqbal said India’s attempts to use water as a tool of pressure had exposed a serious external dimension to Pakistan’s water security. He referred to India’s April 2025 announcement of a unilateral suspension of its obligations under the Indus Water Treaty, which governs distribution of the Indus river system between the two countries.

According to the minister, the weaponisation of water threatens Pakistan’s agriculture, food systems, livelihoods, hydropower potential, environmental flows and ecological stability.

With the federal budget due in about a month, he proposed institutional and financing reforms to align the federal Public Sector Development Programme and provincial Annual Development Programmes with water security priorities. He also called for mobilising climate finance and preparing bankable projects for development partners and the private sector.

"Pakistan must treat water security with the same seriousness with which it treats energy security, food security and territorial security", he said.

Iqbal said new reservoirs should not be seen through the lens of past disputes.

He added that "they must be viewed as national survival assets. Reservoirs are not against any province; water insecurity is against every province".

He added that storage alone would not be enough and called for a national mission on water efficiency and conservation to modernise irrigation, cut conveyance losses, improve water productivity and encourage efficient use in agriculture, industry and urban areas.

The minister said such a mission should include canal modernisation, lining of critical watercourses, laser land levelling, drip and sprinkler irrigation where suitable, digital irrigation scheduling, climate-smart agriculture, wastewater recycling and transparent water accounting through modern telemetry.

He said Pakistan should adopt the principle of more crop per drop and more value per drop through better seeds, water-efficient farming, crop zoning, higher-value and lower-water crops where appropriate, and by aligning subsidies, support prices and policy incentives with the country’s water realities.

Expressing concern over groundwater depletion, Iqbal said groundwater had become Pakistan’s silent lifeline, particularly for agriculture and domestic use, but in many places extraction was outpacing recharge. He called for a national groundwater governance framework based on aquifer mapping, recharge zones, extraction monitoring, regulation in high-stress areas, solar tubewell management and community-based conservation.

He said the future of water management lay in science, data and innovation, and urged adoption of real-time telemetry, satellite-based water monitoring, AI-enabled irrigation forecasting, precision agriculture, smart metering, aquifer mapping, flood modelling, drought early warning systems and digital water accounting.

The minister said Pakistan must shift from water crisis management to water security planning because water security is central to national security, food security, energy security, climate resilience and economic growth. He said the required national consensus should combine new reservoirs, conservation, efficiency and technology-driven governance while moving beyond fragmented and politically contested approaches.

Iqbal said national security in the 21st century was no longer defined only by borders, defence capability or economic size, but was also tied to food security, energy security, climate resilience, public health, agriculture and water security.

"Without water, there can be no agriculture. Without agriculture, there can be no food security. Without reliable water, there can be no industrial competitiveness, urban sustainability, rural prosperity or stable economic growth", he said.

He said Pakistan was once considered water-abundant, with per capita water availability of more than 5,000 cubic meters per year at independence, but that figure had now fallen to around the water-scarcity threshold of 1,000 cubic metres per person per year, making water security a present national emergency.

According to the minister, rapid population growth, rising urban demand, groundwater depletion, pressure on glaciers, erratic rainfall, floods and recurring droughts have intensified the challenge. He said the 2022 floods, which affected more than 33 million people, showed that Pakistan faced not only scarcity but also water mismanagement, with too little water in some seasons and too much in others.

Iqbal warned against getting stuck in political controversies, institutional fragmentation and narrow provincial positions, saying water insecurity would affect the entire federation. He said Sindh needed protection from drought, floods and seawater intrusion; Punjab required reliable irrigation for national food security; Balochistan needed water for human development, livestock, agriculture and drought resilience; while Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Gilgit-Baltistan required hydrological safety, hydropower development and glacier-risk management.

He also called for a reliable national water information system covering river flows, canal withdrawals, groundwater levels, reservoir storage, irrigation demand, rainfall forecasts, flood risks, water quality and climate projections.

"We cannot manage what we do not measure. Technology can help Pakistan reduce losses, increase transparency, improve crop productivity, strengthen early warning systems and build trust among provinces and stakeholders", he said.