Abstract
To ensure water security and sustainability, Pakistan’s policymakers must keep groundwater extractions and stock at reasonable levels. How do policymakers currently manage groundwater? Why have they struggled so far? What are some of the tools that they can harness to improve groundwater allocation? By surveying existing data and literature on Pakistan’s groundwater, I address these questions, identifying the challenges that the country faces in managing groundwater and explaining policy instruments that could tackle these challenges. The chapter serves as a guide for scholars, practitioners, and policymakers interested in contextualizing Pakistan’s groundwater issues and understanding policy prescriptions that incentivize welfare-enhancing extractions.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
References
Bhutta, M. N., & Smedema, L. K. (2007). One hundred years of waterlogging and salinity control in the Indus valley, Pakistan: a historical review. Irrigation and Drainage, 56(S1), S81–S90. https://doi.org/10.1002/ird.333
Bromley, D. W. (1989). Property relations and economic development: The other land reform. World Development, 17(6), 867–877. https://doi.org/10.1016/0305-750X(89)90008-9
Bromley, D. W. (1991). Testing for common versus private property: Comment. Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, 21(1), 92–96. https://doi.org/10.1016/0095-0696(91)90007-6
Bromley, D. W. (1992). The commons, common property, and environmental policy. Environmental and Resource Economics, 2(1), 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00324686
Government of Pakistan. (2018). National water policy. Ministry of Water Resources.
Government of Punjab. (2018). Punjab water policy. Irrigation Department.
Government of Punjab. (2020). Depth to water table map, irrigation zones—Punjab. https://irrigation.punjab.gov.pk/uploads/pages/FeatureLink/Punjab_Maps.pdf. Accessed 21 Sept 2021.
Libecap, G. D. (2008). State regulation of open-access, common-pool resources. In C. Ménard & M. M. Shirley (Eds.), Handbook of new institutional economics (pp. 545–572). Springer.
Lytton, L., Akthar, A., Garthwaite, B., Punthakey, J. F., & Saeed, B. (2021). Groundwater in Pakistan’s Indus Basin: Present and future prospects. World Bank Report. World Bank.
Nasim, S., Helfand, S., & Dinar, A. (2020). Groundwater management under heterogeneous land tenure arrangements. Resource and Energy Economics, 62, 101203. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.reseneeco.2020.101203
Ostrom, E. (2008). Polycentric systems as one approach for solving collective-action problems. Indiana University, Bloomington: School of Public & Environmental Affairs Research Paper 2008-11-02. Indiana University.
Pakistan Bureau of Statistics. (2021a). Brief on census–2017. https://www.pbs.gov.pk/content/brief-census-2017. Accessed 21 Sept 2021.
Pakistan Bureau of Statistics. (2021b). Demographic indicators – 1998 census. https://www.pbs.gov.pk/content/demographic-indicators-1998-census. Accessed 21 Sept 2021.
Qureshi, A. S. (2020). Groundwater governance in Pakistan: From colossal development to neglected management. Water, 12(11), 3017. https://doi.org/10.3390/w12113017
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2023 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Nasim, S. (2023). Managing Pakistan’s Groundwater. In: Ahmad, M. (eds) Water Policy in Pakistan. Global Issues in Water Policy, vol 30. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-36131-9_9
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-36131-9_9
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-031-36130-2
Online ISBN: 978-3-031-36131-9
eBook Packages: Earth and Environmental ScienceEarth and Environmental Science (R0)