The Indus River Basin, ranked as the fourth-largest irrigation system globally, plays a vital role in Pakistan’s economy, contributing up to 25% of its gross domestic product and 90% of its food production.
Various water users, including rural, urban, subsistence, and commercial irrigated agriculture, add complexity to water resource management within the basin.
The increasing local population, combined with challenges from climate change and the need to meet minimum flow requirements, will exacerbate the difficulties of managing water resources in an already water-stressed sub-catchment.
To analyze this intricate system and explore strategies for supply and demand management, the Water Evaluation and Planning System (WEAP) model is widely used.
This study employs WEAP for a scenario analysis, assessing the potential impacts of future water demands on Indus water resources.
Each scenario is compared to the baseline year of 2015 and evaluated under two growth rate scenarios.
These simulations aim to improve understanding of potential future water management challenges.
Projections suggest that by 2040, if the population continues to grow, the water demand for Punjab and Sindh provinces will increase to 192.7 billion cubic meters, surpassing current entitlements and availability.
