Beware of water shortage

While Jakartans have long been warned about the deteriorating quality of groundwater and the decreasing sources due to the worsening environment, PT PAM Lyonnaise Jaya (Palyja), producer of tap water for Jakarta, raised concerns only last week about the looming shortage of raw water sources in the near future.

The supply of raw water from the Jatiluhur (Juanda) dam in Purwakarta, West Java has been steadily reducing over the past few years. This has apparently forced Palyja to work harder due to the fluctuating levels in raw water from the reservoir, which continues to dry up.

It is understandable that the company -- responsible for the production and distribution of tap water -- foresees that Jakarta may suffer from a serious shortage of tap water by 2008.

Jatiluhur reservoir, which receives water from the Citarum river, has long been the dominant source of raw water for Jakarta. The other water resource for the capital is the Cisadane river in Tangerang, Banten. The water trade between Jatiluhur dam and Jakarta started soon after the dam was constructed in the 1960s.

Jatiluhur supplies 80 percent of raw water for more than 700,000 tap water consumers across the city. The remaining 20 percent of the raw water comes from local administration utility PDAM Tangerang, Banten, and the Bogor utility in West Java.

The water level in Jatiluhur dam is now only 92 meters, almost seven meters below the normal level.

The likelihood of a shortage in raw water has actually been known for some time. After the inauguration of the Saguling and Cirata reservoirs in 1986 and 1989 respectively the Jatiluhur dam management has been worried about the supply of water from the Citarum river as the two dams -- built for generating electricity -- are located upstream from the dam. However, the voice of anxiety had not been publicly acknowledged. Jatiluhur dam is under the auspices of the Ministry of Public Works while Saguling and Cirata were then controlled by the then Ministry of Mining and Energy.

The fact that the water from Jatiluhur dam, which flows through West Tarum Canal and several waterways in the city, has been seriously polluted, especially during the dry season, is another strong indication that raw water supply for tap water is in danger. People persist in dumping household waste and garbage into the canals and waterways.

A hydrologist had earlier suggested that the water business between Jakarta and the Jatiluhur dam be limited to between 25 and 30 years owing to the fact that West Java, where the dam is located, would need more water for its own development.

All these facts should have been taken seriously by PAM Jaya the tap water producer and distributor at that time. The absence of a prompt response to the warnings obviously reflects the ignorance of the relevant institutions over the future threat.

If there is no solution found to respond to Palyja's concern about the water shortage in the next three years, city residents will face a serious predicament.

Not only those who subscribe to tap water from Palyja are insecure about tap water, but also those who depend on groundwater will also face difficult times.

Jakarta, home for more than 10 million people needs more than 22 cubic meters of water per second per day, while 70 percent of the water is obtained from groundwater. Given the shrinking groundwater resources due to -- among other things -- the disappearance of space for catchment areas and vanishing green areas designated as catchments, groundwater has become a more and more expensive commodity.

Things have gotten worse. Warnings against the destruction of water resources have been ignored. Campaigns to use water economically have proven inadequate to make all parties aware of the importance of saving water. The only thing Palyja and the city administration can do is persistently and continuously make people more aware of the seriousness of the situation. Both the Jakarta administration and Palyja should ask all sectors of society, including non-governmental organizations, to join hands to do something to improve the environment for the sake of the improvement of water resources.

March 22 is commemorated as World Water Day and institutions and environmentalists dealing with water preservation always stress that better management of water resources is critical to preserving water resources.

UNESCO once stated without better management of water resources and the related ecosystem, two-third of humanity will suffer from severe or moderate shortages by the year 2005. What Palyja and the residents of Jakarta are now experiencing is proof of UNESCO's projection.