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CIAO DATE: 3/5/2007
The household water crisis in Syria's Greater Damascus Region'
Elie Elhadj
May 2004
Abstract
Damascus residents talk in recent years of long periods of daily water shut-offs for most months especially between June and the following January. " In 2001 ... stringent water rationing was in force in Damascus... the authorities ... shut off the capital's piped water supply for 20 hours each day (compared with 16 hours previously) from July of that year. Europa Publications (2002: p.979)."
This study coincides with the debate currently raging on how to solve and finance the deepening domestic water crisis of the Greater Damascus Region and that of the country's other urban centers. The debate is conducted within the boundaries set by the country's four-decade old discourse that considers generous water allocation to agriculture as sacrosanct policy. It centers on expensive inter-basin water transfer schemes from the Euphrates River or the Mediterranean Coast to the Damascus Region (Sections 2.B and 2.C below) so that the volume of water currently used in irrigation will not be reduced.
