President Hassan Rouhani on Thursday inaugurated water projects via video conference in western Kermanshah and Ilam provinces costing $150 million.
"The government has drawn on the National Development Fund of Iran for the key water projects," Rouhani told the inauguration ceremony also attended by his Energy Minister Reza Ardakanian, IRNA reported.
The projects transfer 900 million cubic meters of water per year from Sirvan River in Paveh County, Kermanshah Province, to Ilam Province.
Highlighting the role and proximity of the province, the president said, "Border towns and counties are important and should be developed."
Work included 8,000 kilometers of tunnels, 400 kilometers of pipeline, eight pumping stations, two power substations and 150 kilometers of high-voltage electricity transmission lines completed in seven years.
“The water diversion scheme will help farmers in at least 700 small towns and villages to irrigate 23,000 hectares of land, all of which are equipped with modern irrigation systems,” Ardakanian added.
As per Agriculture Ministry data, there are 8.5 million hectares of farmlands and orchards in Iran, 4.5 million hectares can do much better with modern irrigation systems. At present, the overall area equipped with under pressure irrigation systems is 1.7 million hectares.
Kermanshah province, spread over 24,000 square kilometers, has a population of 2 million with the majority involved in agriculture.
The minister said farmland in the province covers 950,000 hectares, producing more than 4 million tons of agricultural products a year, which is expected to triple in the next 12 months as the new projects will supply farmers more water.
Around half of Iran’s total non-oil export (namely tomato, watermelon, cheese, Persian melon, apples, milk, cream, cucumber and eggplants) to Iraq comes from Kermanshah Province that has six official border crossings.
Water Crisis
“Preserving water resources and reforming the national wastewater system amid a chronic water crisis are front and center to the Energy Ministry’s agenda,” the minister concurred.
Iran should take meaningful steps toward preserving its depleting water resources in the face of a long spell of drought and dwindling rainfall by not only modernizing framing methods but also water recycling, Ardakanian argued, adding that productive use of wastewater resources has gained more traction for obvious reasons: the wells are running dry.
He pointed to plans to upgrade dilapidated farming methods that use almost 90% of the rapidly declining resource.
"Over 20 million hectares (200 billion square meters) of agricultural land in 85 countries are irrigated by wastewater," he said, adding that plans call for expanding use of wastewater in agriculture in a joint effort and help from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN and the World Health Organization.
"In today's world, wastewater is losing its traditional sense and is increasingly referred to as water with different color. We need to look at wastewater as a new resource.”
Referring to a newly opened wastewater treatment plant in Paveh County, he said the facility is helping preserve the city’s underground water resources and optimize wastewater for agriculture as using reclaimed wastewater is the norm for farming.
Over 7.5 billion cubic meters of usable water namely grey water is produced annually in Iran of which less than 25% is recycled.
Based on Energy Ministry data, 221 wastewater treatment plants are operating in Iran with annual output of 1.2 bcm. Total wastewater treatment capacity in 2010 was 400 million cubic meters per day via 150 treatment facilities. That output, which involved a network of 11,000 kilometers, has now tripled.
