Pakistan: Qatar Charity’s solar-powered pump solves water problem in Sindh’s villages

Baghi, 50, lives in a village called “Beb Jobar”, which is located in Tharparkar, the poorest region in the Sindh province of Pakistan.

The region suffers from poor rainfall (average annual rainfall is 9 mm), low levels of groundwater, (250-400 feet), and lack of electricity or frequent power outages, making drinking water a distant dream for the villagers. Thus, access to water there requires physical effort in primitive ways that take many hours. As a result, only less than 5% of the region’s population gets fresh water.

Baghi sums up the suffering of her villagers in getting water in the absence of electricity or frequent power outages. "You need a camel or a pair of donkeys to pull a bucket of water from wells, which are about 250 feet deep in our village and other nearby places, otherwise no one alone can pull a bucket of water from these wells”, says Baghi.

Baghi describes the hardships faced by villagers to get water, which is an essential element of life “a rope is tied around the neck of the camel, which is slowly led by a young boy or girl moving forward from the well at a distance equal to its depth. Through this procedure, the villagers get a bucket of water.

Then, a man carries the bucket and unloads it elsewhere, while another man absorbs air from the other end of the tube to make the water flow directly into the reservoir built just steps away from the well.

She further describes this difficult situation. "We spend 3 – 4 hours to bring 10 – 12 liters of water, and no family can fill its tank in one day, while others wait for their turns."

Baghi regards water as more precious than gold. She states "People close these tanks to ensure that no one can use them or steal them for domestic consumption, so we consider water more expensive than any money or gold ornaments loved and kept by people in bank lockers.”

Water is not only necessary for an estimated 1.5 million people in Tharparkar, but it is also essential for an estimated 5 million livestock.

However, the water problem of Beb Jobar has been solved due to the interventions made by Qatar Charity, which has drilled an artesian well equipped with a solar-powered pump.

Qatar Charity, through its office in Islamabad, adapts various technologies to provide suitable solutions to water problems faced by some areas of Pakistan.

Mohammed Ali, a resident of Beb Jobar, says "the water problem of our village has been overcome, due to the well and solar-powered pump, and now it seems unbelievable that freshwater flows through the pipes to our homes."

It is worth mentioning that Qatar Charity implemented 561 water projects during the first half of 2018, benefiting 74,000 people, while 1079 water projects were carried out in 2017.

Qatar Charity’s intervention, with the significant number of water projects implemented in Pakistan, comes given that more than 60% of the country’s population does not have access to safe drinking water.