Nepal has vast water resources and approximately 67% of its cultivated land can be irrigated. Out of the 1.7 million ha of Nepal’s irrigable land, 78% has been provided with some irrigation infrastructure. Irrigation is vital to Nepal, especially as the country is facing climate change impacts such as rise in temperature and more erratic rainfall patterns, which is creating prolonged periods of droughts and jeopardising the agricultural production nationwide. As the supply of water for agriculture becomes more variable, water resource competition and water conflicts across the country are equally becoming increasingly visible. The Bajrabarahi Village Municipality is one of those rural communities where water conflicts have been clearly on the rise over the last decade.
Floods are a recurrent natural calamity in Pakistan, followed by earthquakes, cyclones and drought. However, drought is more damaging than floods in terms of food insecurity. Evidence of chronic water shortages have been painfully evident in some parts of Pakistan in recent years, due to low rainfall and extreme variations in temperature.