Kamal Ayyash and Mustapha Dahdouh
The decline in water transfer from the source countries of Turkey and Iran due to the construction of dams and the mismanagement of water resources nationally, have all contributed to a decrease in agricultural land and an increase in desertification, consequently leading to the migration of residents and a drop in the production of crops that covered most of the needs of the local Iraqi market in the past.
Luay Al- Khafaji is an Iraqi who was forced to leave his 23 Dunum (57,500 m2) plot of land in the town of Nasseriah, governorate of Thi Qar, due to the drought and the rise in the soil’s salinity. His dream of a mere “water faucet” that would supply Al- Khafaji and his family of six with clean water led him to migrate to the southern governorate of Al- Basra where he found himself in a 60 meter home which was, nevertheless, a vital source of livelihood.
Holding a glass of water, Al- Khafaji describes the reason behind his migration saying: “Water represents life and dignity. Still, I feel sad that circumstances have become so tragic in our village. The drought and the soil salinity have affected everything and agriculture does not exist anymore.”
Al- Khafaji’s situation is similar to that of Khayoun Alewi, whose same predicament forced him to leave his land in the area of Sayyed Dakheel, south of the city of Nasseriah, selling whatever remained of his livestock after losing most of it to the drought. Alewi says: “We have had no water for the past three years which has depleted both our livestock and crops.”
The city of Nasseriah’s economic resources rely on agriculture and livestock. The Ahwar region boasts the largest natural body of water in Iraq and, in 2016, was included in UNESCO’s list of World Heritage Sites. It is home to more than 57 thousand buffaloes. Al- Nasseriah lies 360 kilometres from the capital Baghdad with an area of 1700 kilometres. It is halved by the Euphrates River, that runs through it, and its population is 603 thousand.
The drought problem is not new in Iraq, whose southern region has suffered from a scarcity of water resources since 2003, according to its residents.
Data from the Central Organization for Statistics, indicates that the highest volume of water flow into Iraq was registered in 2004, reaching 65 billion and 960 thousand cubic meters, representing 7.7% of the total water transfer between 2004 and 2020. The lowest volume of water transfer was in 2009, registering 32 billion and 110 thousand cubic meters, representing 3.7% of the total water transferred into the country.
In 2019, there was a substantial rise in the volume of water transfer which reached 93 billion and 510 thousand cubic meters, representing 10.9%. This was not due to an increase in the water transfer from source countries, but rather because of the high volume of rainfall which raised the water levels of rivers and water tanks within the region.
Iraq has two major rivers, the Euphrates and Tigris, both flowing from Turkey and Iran and entering Iraq from its northern borders. Tigris is 1,718 kilometres long from its source to its estuary of Shatt Al- Arab in the south of Iraq. 1,419 kilometres, 83% of the river, lies within Iraqi territories.
Euphrates, on the other hand, is 2,330 kilometres long, 1,200 Km of which flow within Iraq, representing 52% of the river’s total length.
Thaer Mukheef, a member of the Agriculture and Water Committee in the Iraqi Parliament warned against the “dangers of the programmed and systematic” cuts in water transfers by source countries since 2003, referring to what Turkey and Iran were doing to completely cut off the flow of some rivers, either by deliberately changing the direction of their flow or by the construction of dams.
Mukheef adds: “We do not wish to resort to violence or war, but Turkey and Iran need to understand that we are neighbouring countries with rights that should be easily accessed and not barely given. Force may be the final solution because Iraq can no longer tolerate the status quo.”
International law has regulated the utilization of international river water among neighbouring countries. Agreements and treaties have been signed by different states to regulate the use of international watercourses under the title of “Regulations and Conventions for the Non- Navigational Use of International Rivers.”
An example of these agreements is the “Convention of the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses for the year 1997,” which is considered to be one of the most important international conventions and the only one concerned with fresh water and one which applies to all countries and all continents. It also represents a framework for regional and bilateral conventions which regulate the use of trans-boundary watercourses.
Dr, Hasan Al- Janabi, the former Iraqi Minister of Water Resources, spoke in an article published on the Iraqi Economists website in 2014, about the most important provisions of the convention. He referred to article 3 which allows the revision of bilateral agreements to keep them in line with the basic principles of this “International Convention,” while representing a solid legal ground in case of the absence of an international convention among neighbouring countries.
According to Al- Janabi, articles number 5 and 7 represent the essence of the convention, where article 5 of section 2, refers to the principles of usage and sharing in a way which is reasonable and fair to other countries that share the same watercourse. Article 7 stipulates that states shall take all measures necessary to prevent any harm to countries sharing the same watercourse.
During the UN Water Conference held in New York on March 24, 2023, Iraq joined the Convention on the Protection and Use of Trans-boundary Watercourses and International Lakes, known as the UN Water Convention. It aims to ensure the sustainable use of trans-boundary watercourses by facilitating cooperation and improving the domestic management of water resources, making Iraq the first Arab country to join the convention.
Mohammad Al Khazai, official spokesperson for the Iraqi Ministry of Agriculture confirmed that the construction of dams, specifically in Turkey, is carried out without any form of coordination with Iraq or Syria, which violates international laws and conventions that regulate water usage. He indicated also that the political turmoil in Syria and security problems in Iraq have encouraged Turkey to construct these dams and take over the largest share of these international waters.
Mohammad Abbas Nasser, Assistant Director of Agriculture in Thi Qar governorate, says that in the past, Iraq used to suffer from an overflow of water supply, which led previous governments since the establishment of the state, to implement projects that control floods which shows that the construction of dams at the time was not to merely manage water resources, but rather to protect against the usual flooding of cities from Al- Mosul to Baghdad, reaching Al- Kut south east of Baghdad.
This investigations made use of data from the UN Food and Agriculture Organization FAO, which cover all dams around the world, to examine dams that were constructed in Turkey, Iran, Syria and Iraq, analysing the period and aims behind their construction in addition to the capacity of each dam.
Turkey has 582 dams, 28 of which were constructed in the years 2003, 2004 and 2005. The highest of these dams is 240 meters high and their total storage capacity is 158 billion cubic meters. According to available data, the vast majority of these dams (508) were constructed for irrigation purposes. The number of dams used for water supply is 77 dams, while those used to generate electric power are 65 dams, and there are 64 dams used for the purpose of flood control.
According to available data, Iraq has 16 dams, the last of which was built in 1989, and the highest is 131 meters. The total storage capacity for these dams exceeds 150 billion cubic meters. Most of them (9 dams) were constructed for irrigation purposes. Four dams were built for flood control while only two are used for generating electric power.
Iran, on the other hand, has 83 dams, 18 of which were constructed after 2003. The total storage capacity of these dams exceeds 31 billion cubic meters. Most were built for irrigation purposes (80 dams), while 46 dams are used for water supply. 27 dams are used to generate electric power.
Syria has 78 dams, only two of which were constructed after 2003. The height of some of these dams reaches 87 meters high, and their total storage capacity exceeds 16 billion cubic meters. Most were constructed for irrigation purposes (7 dams), while only one dam is used for water supply and another is used for flood control. Three dams are used to generate electric power.
The area of Iraq constitutes 14% of the total area of the four countries. The total area of agricultural land in source countries and estuaries combined is nearly 108 million hectares, 9% of which are located within Iraq.
Between the years 2011 and 2020, agricultural land in Turkey decreased by 953 thousand hectares, while land planted with temporary and permanent crops increased by 1% each year since 2011.
In Iran, between 2011 and 2020, agricultural land increased by 431 thousand hectares, while in Iraq and during the same period agricultural land increased by 700 thousand hectares. However, since 2015, and due to the water shortage in Iraq, the volume of agricultural land decreased until the percentage of cultivated land did not exceed 27% in 2018.
As for forest areas, data shows an increase in Turkey, Iran and Syria. In Turkey, the increase was one million and 27 thousand hectares between 2011 and 2020. During the same period, Iran showed an increase of 60 thousand hectares while Syria showed an increase of 24 thousand hectares. Iraq, however, did not show any increase in forest areas.
Due to the fact that the agricultural sector was the one most affected by the scarcity of water supply, the Iraqi Ministry of Agriculture recently issued several decisions to conserve water used for irrigation. One of these was prohibiting the supply of seeds and pesticides to farmers who do not use modern irrigation systems, especially owners of larger plots of land.
Dr Saleh Hadi Salem, a lecturer in the Faculty of Agriculture in the University of Thi Qar, calls upon the central government to adopt modern irrigation channel projects by signing contracts with manufacturing companies that specialize in irrigation and allowing the private sector to import and make use of such technology.
To compensate for the shortage in water supply, the Ministry of Agriculture depends heavily on rain and snow fall to raise water reserves and make use of them in cultivating a strategically important and special kind of rice called (Al- Shalb) in the governorates of Najaf, Al- Diwaniah and Al- Samawa during the summer season.
The amount of rainfall in Iraq, witnessed a substantial rise in 2019, reaching 9,120 millilitres representing 37.7% of the total water, according to data from the Central Statistics Organization for the years 2014 until 2020. Iraq also witnessed a rise in the area of cultivated land which doubled between 2015 and 2018, but still did not match the rise in the volume of land cultivated with wheat and barley in 2014. The production rate in the country doubled due to the increase in water supply which resulted from the high levels of rainfall in the region in 2019 and 2020.
Mohammad Al- Khazai, spokesperson for the Iraqi Ministry of Agriculture, defended the ministry’s decision to “decrease the cultivated land area for certain crops by 50%” stating that these measures had to be taken in light of the scarcity of water supplies and that decreasing the area of cultivated land was better than halting the agricultural process altogether.
According to UN data, water scarcity becomes a problem when the per capita annual share of water is less than 1500 cubic meters. This means that Iraq suffers from water scarcity. Data analysis from 2004 and 2020 shows that Iraq has not witnessed an abundance of water supply since 2008, except in 2019, which witnessed a rise in the levels of rainfall.
Data analysis also shows that the country needs to raise its total water resources to 64 billion cubic meters annually in order to meet its per capita needs, especially after its population reached 43 million in 2023.
According to several academics and activists, the older irrigation methods are not the only reason behind wasteful water use. Ill-advised government decisions also play a role.
Zeinab Fadel, an environmental activist and researcher, blames “municipal departments” for wasting water resources through their excessive daily use of water tanks, even during winter, for the irrigation of public parks, instead of using modern irrigation systems.
Fadel states: “Contracts signed with oil companies stipulate using sea water to irrigate oil wells, however, some companies use up half the share of fresh water, allocated for the governorate of Al- Basra, for the irrigation of these wells.”
Turkey comes in first place in its total water storage capacity which equals the storage capacity of the four countries combined. Iraq comes in second regarding its storage capacity and the availability of enough water storage facilities.
The above confirms that Luay Al- Khafaji, Khayoun Alewi and hundreds others will not be able to return to their lands after the “drought and thirst” became an undeniable reality for the Iraqis. Matters could get worse if Turkey decides to completely fill its dams in violation of international agreements and conventions.
