Estimating the Volume of Water Consumption of Diyala Governorate to Cope With Water Deficit

Abstract

The current study aims to estimate the volume of water consumption of Diyala Governorate to cope with water deficit. The researchers studied the annual revenues of the rearward part of the river (Himreen dam), the main source of water in Diyala, to show the temporal variation in the amount of the annual revenue of the river for the period of the study from 1981 to 2015.The study is done after excluding the water requirements of Khanaqeen and Kifri inhabitants as they take their water share before the storage. The researchers chose the year 1985 being of the highest revenue, 2009 being of the lowest revenue and 2015. They compared these revenues to the agricultural needs of the governorate. The study shows that there is a water deficit and the revenues are not sufficient to meet agricultural requirements during the season. The agricultural plan indicators were approved with an area of (15822) acres of which (6620) acres for Crops and (9202) acres for vegetables distributed according to the source of irrigation. After the overall balancing between the water revenues and consumption of Diyala basin, it becomes clear that the total requirements of Diyala basin is (7.97) billion/m3. When that requirements are compared with the annual average of the rearward part of Himreen dam for the period (1981-2015) which reaches to (4.1) billion/m3, it is concluded that, there is a negative balance of (-3.87) billion/m3. Thus, the water deficit in Diyala basin is evident. Therefore, it is necessary to make a proper plan for the water sources of the region understudy and to rationalize the consumption, especially from the agricultural side. This should be achieved by linking the drainage projects in the basin to an integrated network and then delivering it to a prime drain in order to avoid the spread of salt in the agricultural land.