SAI urges completion of effluent recycling project

Karchi: Chairman, Site Association of Industry (SAI) Muhammad Nisar Sheikhani has urged the government to expedite work on the project of recycling of effluent for industrial use.

In a communication to the Minister for Industries and Commerce, M A Rauf Siddiqui, he said that a few years back a project was initiated to treat 30 to 35 MGD effluents going into the sea to provide 16 to 18 MGD treated water for industrial use.

He said that under the WTO regulation every industrial area has to have a combined effluent treatment plant. For this purpose in collaboration with Asian Development Bank (ADB) a site has been selected at TP-III Mariner and the federal government was also taking keen interest in the project. Site chairman urged the ministry to take the initiative and remove bottlenecks in the way of its implementation.

He pointed out that Site industrial area comprises around 60 percent of textile industry, which consumes huge quantity of water. At present Site industrial area water quota is 8 MGD whereas it is getting only 5MGD to 6 MGD of water per day. The total requirement of the area is 30 MGD of water per day, he added.

He noted that Site Association had been continuously asking the government for the supply of 8 MGD water per day but nothing has been done in this regard so far. The Site industrial area, which is sharing the burden of the government by contributing 40 percent to the national exchequers, has not been benefited from the commissioning of K-3 project of KWSB.

At the time of the inauguration of the K-3 project, Site was assured that it would get 6 MGD extra water in addition to its allocated quota of 8 MGD round the clock, but again this promise has not been fulfilled.

It will be recalled that 22 MGD water had been allocated for the industries in Karachi, out of the additional 100 MGD to be supplied to the city after completion of K-3 project and industries in Site area will get 6 MGD additional water under this arrangement. This will be in addition to the allocated quota of 8 MGD fixed by the previous governments.

As per the statistics available with Site, the total supply is not going beyond 5.5 MGD per day, which is very small against the requirement of 30 MGD to 35 MGD per day.