President Rouhani Calls for Cut in Water Consumption

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said on Monday that water and electricity bring security for the country, and called for a 10 to 20 percent reduction in agricultural consumption of water with the use of new methods.

“The right way of water consumption and not wasting it is very important and the media should promote the right etiquette for water and power consumption.” Rouhani said, speaking in a meeting with Minister of Energy Reza Ardekanaian and the ministry’s deputies and managers today.

He went on to refer to the Supreme Leader’s remarks on right consumption of power, saying, “Managing water resources of the country should be based on continued draught and in doing so, the most important step is to minimize wasting water and power.”

The president added, “Water and power are two infrastructural and vital needs of the people. Air and oxygen is the first need of human beings, but maybe the second important thing is water”.

Describing water and power as things that bring security for the people, he continued, “While visiting the central power control of the country, I realized that great things have been done for balancing production and consumption.”

The head of government also said, “This is very important and we need to put decreasing the loss in water and power industry top in the priority list to reduce the amount to a single-digit figure.”

He also referred to the importance of calculating the efficiency of farming and agriculture in the country, saying, “We also need to investigate if cultivation of fruits and vegetables inside the country is efficient and if it is not, we have to rent farmlands in other countries.”

The President also said, “We need to encourage farmers to cultivate crops by making the deal profitable for them”.

Rouhani underscored the importance of greenhouse farming and modern irrigation systems, saying, “If we reduce agricultural water consumption by 10 to 20 per cent a year, it will have good effects.”

He stressed that sometimes dams have negative climatic impacts, saying, “What the government did by restoring Lake Urmia was saving 14 million people.”

source: FARS News Agency