Rural Electrification in Pakistan

Rural Electrification in Pakistan

  September 08, 2019    Fantasy

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•    67.5% of population lives in rural areas
•    Most of rural areas are deprived of even basic facilities of modern life
•    Electricity can prove milestone in rural development

Advantages of Rural Electrification in Pakistan:

Installation of tube wells

•    Tube wells can be installed for irrigation

Controlling Water logging and Salinity

•    This also helps to control water logging and salinity

Growth in Agriculture

•    There will be increase in agriculture production

Growth in small scale industries

•    Small scale industries can be developed to provide employment and to meet the demand of industrial goods

Improvement in living standards

•    Standard of living increases.
•    People can use electrical appliances

Access to information technology

•    People can receive the electronic media and access information technology

Programs for Rural Development in Pakistan:

•    There are many programs for rural development like
o    Village Aid
o    Basic Democracy and
o    Rural Works Program
•    Providing electricity to rural areas was one of the main targets of these programs.
•    The number of villages electrified increased to 99,595 by March 2006, against 40,784 in 1991-92.

Constraints or challenges of Rural Electrification in Pakistan:

Small villages are far

•    Many of the small villages especially in KP and Baluchistan are far from transmission lines

High set up and maintenance costs

•    the cost of laying and maintaining transmission lines is high and is an extra burden on the country's major economic resources

Economically not feasible

•    It is not economically feasible to provide electricity to very small villages yet; the government has set limits so that in KP and Sindh villages with fewer than 1000 people and in Baluchistan fewer than 300 people will not be supplied.

Solution

•    In order to help solve the above problems electricity generation programs using bio-gas and solar energy are being tested.