Sindh Water and Agriculture Transformation Project (SWAT)

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The development objective of the Sindh Water and Agriculture Transformation (SWAT) Project for Pakistan is to increase agricultural water productivity in selected farmers’ organization command areas, improve integrated water resources management (IWRM), and contribute to restoring crop production by small and medium‐sized farmers affected by the 2022 floods. The project comprises of six components. The first component, water resources management establishes a provincial IWRM system. It consists of following sub-components: (i) institutional development for IWRM; (ii) provision of technical assistance for the development of a Sindh strategic water plan (SSWP); and (iii) support for hydro‐agro informatics (HAI) program. The second component, water service delivery will improve the performance of the multipurpose canal network and irrigation service to farmers. It consists of following sub-components: (i) integrated development of approximately 15 farmers’ organization (FO) areas; (ii) FO, area water board (AWB), and Sindh irrigation and drainage authority (SIDA) capacity building; (iii) left bank main canal upgrading; and (iv) right bank studies. The third component, targeted agricultural incentives and investments promotes the adoption of climate‐smart practices for traditional crops such as wheat, rice, cotton, and sugarcane, as well as the transition to higher value, water‐thrifty crops such as oilseeds, pulses, fruits, and vegetables. It consists of following sub-components: (i) integrated development of the same 15 FOs supported under subcomponent 2.1; (ii) financing smart subsidy payments to targeted farmers; (iii) improving the agricultural information and technology base; (iv) enhancing the agriculture value chain; and (v) implementation support to the agriculture delivery unit (ADU). The fourth component, project coordination and monitoring support will support continuous evaluation to ensure there will be lessons learned from the interventions in the project. The fifth component, agricultural flood emergency rehabilitation component will also finance supporting services to facilitate implementation, including communication and social mobilization through non‐governmental organizations (NGOs), information technology (IT) design, implementation support to the cash transfer mechanism, and third‐party monitoring and verification. The sixth component is contingent emergency response. Following an adverse natural event that causes a major natural disaster, the government may request the World Bank (WB) to reallocate project funds to support response and reconstruction.