Salty wells leave Jawzjan villagers waiting for safe drinking water — Pajhwok

SHIBERGHAN (Pajhwok): While a charity has launched a safe drinking water distribution programme in remote villages of northern Jawzjan province, residents of some of these areas say successive droughts have left their well water salty and unfit for use. They have called for the programme to be expanded and continued. Climate change and successive droughts in recent years have caused water shortages in many countries around the world, including Afghanistan and Jawzjan province. A number of Jawzjan residents, including farmers, have long complained about water shortages, saying that in some remote villages of the province, falling groundwater levels have made well water salty and unsuitable for drinking. The Madaniyat Charity Foundation has been distributing safe drinking water in remote villages of Shiberghan, the provincial capital and in some districts of the province for the past two months. Salty water problem in Qala-i-Chaghchi village Qala-i-Chaghchi village in Shiberghan, home to dozens of families, is facing a shortage of safe drinking water. Cracked, dry land and withered trees are signs of the severe water shortage in the area. On a hot summer day, a water tanker arrives in the village to distribute water to residents. As soon as they hear it, children, adults and young people come out of their homes carrying yellow containers and queue up to collect drinking water. They…