WIO
Update – 31st March 2012
Industry Up, Agriculture Down
An
agrarian state disobeys its own Water Policy and favours industries at the cost
of agriculture. Odisha’s water
management on a wrong path!
Agriculture
declines as water to industry increases
·
Water allocation to industries from rivers
in Odisha goes up by 224 per cent in just two years
·
Irrigation coverage of the state has
increased marginally.
·
Net
sown area has reduced by 4, 38,000 hectares.
·
The increased allocation of water to
industries deprived at least 1, 68,000 ha of land from irrigation.
In Odisha net sown areas have come down while irrigation
coverage has marginally increased. This is when the water allocation to
industries has gone up drastically. We at Water Initiatives Odisha (WIO) have
just found it out based on analysis of the recent government statistics. In a state, where agriculture is still the
mainstay of the economy and whose water policy prioritizes ‘irrigation’ far
above ‘industries’ this shows how the government is favouring the industries at
the cost of agriculture.
In February this year the Chief Minister of the state
revealed the latest statistics of water allocation to industries. According to this data, there are 337
industries which are either drawing water or have been permitted to draw water
from the 11 river basins of the state.
This is a huge increase, almost of about 224 per cent
just in two years!
According to the Department of Water Resources’ Annual
Report 2009-2010, only 86 industries and other establishments had been
allocated water from river basins of the state.
The total water allocated to the 86 industries and other commercial
establishments as per 2009-2010 annual report was 1993.366 cusecs. As per the latest figures, the industrial
allocation has increased to 5102 cusecs.
Only 286.272 cusecs of this was allocated prior to the formation of the
Water Allocation Committee.
So the water allocation to industries before a decade was
just 286.272, which has now increased to 5102 cusecs, an increase of 17
times!
This only shows how the river basins are at increasing
stress but also irrigation is neglected.
Even as the government went on increasing water allocation
to industries, it failed to provide the necessary irrigation to the
farmers.
During the last decade (2000-01 to 2009-2010), the net
irrigation in Kharif increased by about 29 per cent only, from about 15,90,000
hectare to about 20,59,000 hectare. The
increase in net irrigation in Rabi during this same period increased by about
45 per cent from about 5, 36,000 hectare to about 9,80,000 hectare.
This marginal increase does not seem to have benefited
farmers of the state at large as the net sown area of the state has decreased
by 4, 38,000 hectares, from 58, 45,000 ha in 2001-02 to 54,07,000 ha in
2010-11.
Agriculture, which provides employment to 60 per cent of the
state’s total workforce, is being deliberately neglected in the state.
While farmers are increasingly abandoning farming and are
crying for ensured irrigation facilities, the increase in water allocation to
industries at the cost of irrigation is unfortunate. Compared to the huge employment potential in
the farming sector, heavy industries and mining - the two sectors who are major
beneficiaries of the above increased allocation of water – provide negligible
employment.
Take for example the direct employment generated by heavy
industries such as steel, cement, aluminium, etc. These projects have provided employment only
to about 80, 561 people. Mining, a
major beneficiary of water allocation in the state, provides direct employment
only to 51, 877 people. In fact the
employment in mining sector is decreasing over the years. This shows how the water allocation in the
state is biased towards industries and mining despite of the fact that they
don’t generate benefit to the needy people of the state. This is mockery of the State Water Policy.
Another startling fact that testifies how the government
neglects agriculture is the increasing barren land in the state.
While a vast chunk of the state is turning barren, the
‘culturable waste land’ and ‘land put to non-agricultural use’ categories
together have increased by a whopping 2, 82,000 ha. Considering that 1 cusec of water can provide
irrigation to approximately 35 ha of land, at least 60 per cent of these land
could have been brought into cultivation had the decadal increase in water
allocation to industries would have been used to create irrigation.
This could have saved lakhs of farmers from leaving
farming and would have arrested the degradation process of at least 1, 68,000
ha of land. The number of cultivators in
the state is sharply falling. Between
1991 and 2001, as many as 11, 64,000 cultivators had left farming! The latest figures are yet to be available
but we are sure it would have been much more heart breaking.
Water Initiatives Odisha urges upon the government to
immediately look into this discrimination against irrigation. Stop favouring the industries at the
cost of irrigation.
For further details, please contact:
Ranjan Panda
Convenor, Water Initiatives Odisha (WIO)
Cell: 94370-50103
Email: ranjanpanda@gmail.com
=================
Water Initiatives Odisha (WIO) is a state level coalition of civil
society organisations, farmers, academia, media and other concerned, which has
been working on water, environment and climate change issues in the state for
more than two decades now.
