A Study of the Imperatives and Repercussions of Sewage Water in Vegetables Production in District Faisalabad Pakistan: A Farmer’s Perspective

Abstract

Pakistan is developing agricultural country where majority of population live in the rural areas. In Pakistan agriculture is the backbone of economy although industrial sector is growing very fast. The vegetable is grown in all rural and semi-urban areas but in the peri urban region of the country the production of the vegetables is very high. There are different challenges faced by the farmers to get the good yield of vegetables in which one of the biggest challenges is the shortage of clean water for the irrigation purposes. Therefore, the farmers are compelled to use sewerage water for the irrigation and vegetable production. There are two ways for utilizing the sewage water, it may be used as treated (recycled water) or non-treated (raw wastewater) source of water for irrigation and vegetable production. The treated and untreated sewerage water in Pakistan contain very high   quantity of pathogenic microorganism, poisonous chemical and toxic industrial effluent. There is also very high quantity of metals like zinc, manganese, nickel, chromium, cadmium, and lead the sewerage water used for the irrigation and vegetable production.Therefore, the present study was conducted in peri-urban areas of Faisalabad. Initially four towns were selected through random stratified sampling and each comprising of 30 respondents.Sample of 120 respondents were selected. We used two methods for getting information, semi structured interviews scheduled either at the farms or the houses of respondents. Data were analyzed using both descriptive and inferential statistics through the statistical package for social sciences (SPSS).Vegetables irrigated by sewage water (industrial and domestic) serious hazards to plant and ultimately to human health. Industrial wastewater causes gathering of heavy metals in plants that are contaminated and cause of stop of crop growth and consequence of seed propagation. The Insufficiency of additional water assets is a major problem, because of which asset under privilege nations are exploiting negligible superiority water for water system purposes. The sewage water should not be used for drinking purpose for animals because it causes abnormalities in animals. The discharge of unprocessed effluents, solid wastes and wastewater from industries, households and institutions are the main foundations of water pollution.