There is either a self-destructive streak in some segments of the populace or they fail to see the demarcation between national interest and self-interest. There are some other possibilities too: ignorance and deliberate distortion of facts. Ignorance is not bliss in this case while the later attitude can only be regretted.

These factors have made the construction of water reservoirs, a dire need for an agriculture-based economy, controversial and the same conceptually flawed reasoning is in evidence from some quarters with regard to lining of the country's water courses.

Firstly, the project is being seen as replacement of reservoirs; nothing could be farther from reality because conserving water and minimizing conveyance losses is one thing and building new resources with water reservoirs is quite another. There just are no grounds for mixing the two.

Although the end they serve is augmenting the farming sector, lining of water channels aims at increasing the efficiency of existing resources while reservoirs add to them. Otherwise, they are both linked with the requirements of the farming sector.

Lining of water channels is expected to increase productivity by efficient utilization of resources, improve irrigation facilities, strengthen farmer's participation in the management of water, curb rural migration by creating work opportunities in rural areas and generally promote condition for progress of the rural areas.

What needs to be seen in the case of reservoirs is whether existing resources are sufficient for the agriculture sector or that its productivity has become dependent on additional water while lining of water channels becomes essential if water is being wasted through seepages, leakages, spillage, over-topping at crossings, at intersections, at elevated reaches, etc.

In a country like Pakistan where availability of water is shrinking, this can be a vital effort for maximizing utilization of water, more so as the economic strength of the country is agriculture; it provides raw materials for most exports too.

An assessment of water losses in water channels becomes the starting point for undertaking a project for lining and straightening of channels. There is no disagreement that water is lost during conveyance in the farms but the question is the quantity of this water. Experts place it at around 40 percent. How reliable is this figure?

A number of studies have been carried out for this purpose by both national and international agencies. They were conducted in different areas and dissimilar conditions over a thirty-year period.

The lowest percentage of water losses was recorded at around 30 percent while the maximum was placed at 50 percent. The average comes to about 40 percent. National and international experts and agencies undertook at least 15 major studies on this issue between 1974 and 1998.

The first survey by IBRD in May 1974 placed losses during watercourses conveyance at 25 percent while another study in August, the same year, put them at 30 percent. A third evaluation in a SCARP command area assessed that 30 to 50 percent water, average 40 percent, was being lost during conveyance.

A study in 1975 that related to watercourses losses with the composition and conditions of banks of these channels put the losses at 50 percent. Measurements on 61 watercourses, managed by Wapda and UNDP in 1976-77 revealed that losses were up to 45 percent in these channels.

According to a technical report of Wapda that had covered 40 watercourses in Punjab and Sindh over a period of 14 months and surveyed the situation during different seasons in 1977 concluded that 47 percent of water was being lost. Losses of water from mogha to field were placed at 33 percent to 65 percent, average 47 percent by a study in 1978.

A study by On-Farm Water Management (OFWM) Training Institute of Punjab in 1981, covering 60 randomly selected watercourses placed losses in these channels at 33 percent. According to the report of Punjab's Expert Committee on Irrigation Problems in 1984, water wasted in the channels stood at 40 percent.

Five studies conducted between 1988 and 1996 by Wapda, IWASRI, Planning and Development Department (P&DD) of Punjab and OFWM were no different as their estimates of water losses ranged between a minimum of 33 percent and a maximum of 49 percent.

The conclusion to be drawn is that losses in watercourses are a serious problem causing a reduction in available water and thus undermining the productivity of the agriculture sector and marring its growth.

The task of managing water has been performed in Punjab by OFWM and its various projects have been evaluated for impact on productivity, conservation of water resources and income and labor of farmers, besides other areas of impact on the farming sector. All evaluations have been of a positive nature and inform that the sector and its managers, the farmers, have gained through improvement and lining of watercourses.

Monitoring and evaluation of an OFWM project in 1984 informed that conveyance losses were reduced by 25 percent in the command area, cropping intensity was enhanced by 5.8 percent while crop yield improved by 14. 8 percent.

Gains were also made in the command area by application of laser leveling of fields but that is another subject. Ten evaluation reports on the impact of lining of watercourses between 1984 and 2001 produced similar positive results and noted that progress had been made in all areas of the farming sector by enhancing the efficiency of water on the farms.

The maximum saving of water was 26 percent while the highest gains in cropping intensity stood at 26 percent and the best in produce enhancement was 24.3 percent. These are no small achievements. Farmers were the obvious beneficiaries of these efforts.

But the problem with these programmes has been their bits and pieces nature, limited coverage areas and their thin spread. What was needed was a comprehensive nation-wide project that took on the entire spectrum of the agriculture sector. The 66 billion-rupee four-year project aimed at renovating water courses across the country seems to be the correct approach for achieving overall improvement in the sector.

As noted above, the project is not a replacement for water reservoirs; it cannot be. But it could help tidy things for Pakistan's agriculture till a reservoir or reservoirs are built. The earliest possibility for constructing a reservoir is ten years. What exactly can be the harm if the sector can be made to perform better till then?