Shawger dam in Koya benefits

A stockman revealed to Kurdistan 24 “last year we used to get water from Koya by water-carrier tankers. Now it takes us 10 minutes to get 100 tankers of water every day, if it wasn’t that dam, we would have sold out our livestock”

Shawger dam in Koya. (Photo: Kurdistan 24)
Shawger dam in Koya. (Photo: Kurdistan 24)

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan 24) – The Shawger dam in Koya plain built and completed this year with a budget 5 billion and 630 million dinars. Its depth is 23 meters, can save almost 1 million and 300 thousand m3 water.

Building this dam has brought prosperity to the surrounding villages, the residents who live nearby noticed the difference and benefits of that service. Kurdistan 24 interviewed few farmers and local residents.

They are happy and explained how their requirements met in regard to need to water especially in summer.

A stockman revealed to Kurdistan 24 “last year we used to get water from Koya by water-carrier tankers. Now it takes us 10 minutes to get 100 tankers of water every day, if it wasn’t that dam, we would have sold out our livestock”

“Without that dam, we would have had abandoned our village this year,” Saeed Abdulwahab said.

Another resident, Askandar Nadr who own a tractor vehicle, described the way he gets benefit from the dam, “the residents in the villages surround the dam, use it for everything apart from drinking the water,”

He added “in the past, we had to drive for more than an hour to bring some water from Koya” 

Peshraw Fatah, another stockman, said “we have used this dam to take water home for our livestock and gardens as well, we used it for our needs, we did not have water and the wells had dried up”

He further added “last year we would receive water from water carrier tankers,” 

According to the residents’ words, in addition to the Shawger dam, both the government and farmers themselves have built several large, medium and small ponds in the Koya plain. That farmers can restore water during the rainfall season then use it for livestock and agriculture.

In the past four years, the ponds, water reservoir and dams the regional government built, have the capacity to store almost 150 million cubic meters of water.

Translated by Seyran