LONDON, 11 July — Saudi Arabia will need to produce an additional three million cubic meters of fresh water per day to sustain the present level of supply by the end of next decade, a major water conference was told here yesterday.
Dr. Adil Bushnak, chairman of the Bushnak Water Group, told delegates attending a conference on “Opportunities in Middle East Water Projects” in London, to look for a mjor changes in water policy in the coming year.
He outlined the current organization of water supply within the Kingdom, detailing the areas of responsibility overseen by the Ministry of Municipalities and Rural Affairs and the Ministry of Agriculture and Water.
He cited the increasing need for fresh water within the Kingdom quoting figures to show that three million cubic meters per day above the current level of production will be needed by 2019 “simply to maintain the present level of service.” He indicated that an extra 16 million cubic meters a day will actually be needed to allow economic growth.
Part of the increased output of water will come from desalination plants. The existing plants are now well into their design life and, if not replaced or upgraded, their output will decline from three million cubic meters a day in 2001 to about 1.5 million by 2019.
Efforts are being made in that direction as part of the gas initiative. At least two of the three tenders include major desalination projects as part of the contractual arrangements.
As most of Saudi Arabia’s water is coming from non-renewable sources and 90 percent of water used in the Kingdom is used in agriculture, Dr. Bushnak said there would be a shift in agricultural policy. As well as limiting the subsidy for wheat production and banning the export of animal fodder, he foresaw the introduction of water metering on wells and the encouragement of water re-use.
One interesting move, he pointed out, was the development of saline agriculture. It is possible that in just a few years, non-human food crops could be watered by seawater, thus diverting a substantial percentage of agricultural water use away from the groundwater sources.
Dr. Bushnak indicated that a total investment of SR277 billion was needed in the water infrastructure up to 2020 in order to address the problem. To encourage inward investment in privatized projects, he maintained that a realistic tariff for water and sanitation needed to be established to allow the recovery of the cost of the projects. The government should set in place a process to buy bulk or re-cycled water and deliver it to farms on the edges of cities to encourage use of recycled water.
Dr. Bushnak was optimistic that many major projects — pipelines, plants and water networks — will begin in the next few years.
He declined to accept claims by UNESCO and WHO that Saudi Arabia will reach a point by 2025 when extraction of groundwater will not be possible.
