Over the last 45 years of operations WAPDA’s strategy has been a two pronged attack on the ailment, symptomatic and curative, the former to provide immediate relief, offsetting the effects of the disease by lowering of underground water table through installation of tubewells, and the latter to provide long term solution to the problem by constructing drains, both surface and sub-surface i.e. Vertical (Tubewells) and Horizontal (Tile Drainage), for drainage of saline effluent safely. The overall agenda included improvement of farm practices to facilitate surface drainage and to block seepage of water to raise the underground water level. So far 65 Salinity Control and Reclamation Projects (SCRAPs) have been completed to cover an area of about 7.864 million hectares (19.432 million acres) throughout the country with the help of 16950 SCRAPs tubewell including 12746 Fresh Groundwater Tubewells 3843 Saline Groundwater Tubewells and 361 Scavenger Wells. Over 14718 kilometer long surface drains and 12612 kilometer tile drains have been constructed at total cost of Rs.66.456 billion including the cost of SCARP Transition, 2^nd SCRAP Transition and Private Tubewell Development Projects.

 Present Works 

a)       Irrigation: Following three major canal projects are in hand need also be included:

1.      Greater Thal Canal Project (Punjab), Costing Rs.30467 Million.

2.      Kacchi Canal project (Balochistan), Costing Rs.31204 Million.

3.      Rainee Canal Project (Sindh), Costing Rs.18862 Million.

These projects are included in WAPDA’s Vision 2025 Programme and are under construction. 

b)     Drainage: Three drainage projects RBOD Stage-I, RBOD Stage-III (Balochistan effluent disposal) and Mirpur Khas drainage tubewells works at total cost of Rs.9.374 billion to facilitate the existing drainage area / disposal of saline and flood effluent are under different stages of construction in Sindh and Balochistan Provinces.