Resource information
The landscape of Pakistan is highly varied, with mountains, deserts and the vast, irrigated Indus River Valley providing distinctly different productive opportunities for the population of nearly 208 million people. Combined access to land and water is critical to rural productivity. The densely-settled Indus Basin Irrigation System (IBIS) is the breadbasket of the country and produces the commodities that drive industry, with raw cotton and cotton textiles accounting for some 50–60 percent of exports. The Indus river basin is a resource shared with India, China and Afghanistan, with 47 percent of the IBIS land area in Pakistan (FAO 2011b). The 1960’s Indus Water Treaty with India governs Pakistan’s access to water and maintains a precarious balance in an already water scarce region. Populations in the arid and semi-arid mountainous areas in the west and north of the country are more dispersed; farmers cultivating rainfed land known as barani rely upon smaller irrigation systems to support their crop and livestock enterprises.
