Jakarta, ABIM (6/5/2023) – The Directorate General of Water Resources of the Ministry of Public Works and Public Housing (PUPR) continues to build dams to boost the supply of water for irrigation of agricultural land throughout Indonesia. Indonesia is expected to be able to meet national water and food security needs with enhanced water supplies from dams.
According to PUPR Minister Basuki Hadimuljono, the existence of dams throughout the country has raised the planting index, resulting in enhanced national rice production. “The dam’s construction is followed by the construction of the irrigation network.” Dams built at enormous expenses might thus be helpful since water is guaranteed to flow to farmers’ fields,” Minister Basuki explained.
The Karangnongko Dam, located on the boundary of Bojonegoro Regency in East Java and Blora Regency in Central Java, is one of the dams in the planning stages. The Karangnongko Dam construction is outlined in the Regulation of the Coordinating Minister for the Economy No. 21 of 2022, which is the Second Amendment to the Regulation of the Coordinating Minister for the Economy No. 7 of 2021 concerning Changes to the List of National Strategic Projects (PSN).
The Directorate General of Water Resources of the PUPR Ministry, in collaboration with the Blora Regency Government, conducted a Coordination Meeting to accelerate the construction of the Karangnongko Dam at the end of April 2023. The dam construction is currently in the preliminary stage for land acquisition in the Blora region.
Head of BBWS Bengawan Solo Maryadi Utama hopes for support from all parties to accelerate the construction of the Karangnongko Dam. “Hopefully the construction of the dam which is included in this National Strategic Project can run smoothly according to the target and will provide benefits by improving the welfare of the surrounding community,” Maryadi Utama said.
The Karangnongko Dam technically has an inundation area of 1,026.55 hectares with an effective capacity of 59.1 million m3. This dam is projected to be able to supply irrigation water in the Solo Valley Werken area of 62,000 hectares. Solo Valley Werken itself is a program for creating irrigation networks and building flood control since the time of the Dutch East Indies Government which spanned from Bojonegoro, Tuban, Lamongan, Gresik and Surabaya.
The irrigation water supply for the Karangnongko Dam will be distributed through the Karangnongko Kiri Irrigation Area (DI) Karangnongko Kiri (Blora Regency) covering an area of 1,746 hectares with a discharge of 2.85 m3/second and DI Karangnongko Kanan (Bojonegoro Regency) covering an area of 5,203 hectares with a discharge of 7.90 m3/second.
In addition to irrigating agricultural land, the Karangnongko Dam and its three barrages under it, namely the Bojonegoro barrage, the Babat barrage and the Sembayat barrage will later operate in an integrated manner to provide water for irrigation needs and raw water of 1,155 liters/second in the Bengawan Solo Hilir area which is in the Regency of Ngawi, Bojonegoro, Blora, Tuban, Lamongan to Gresik. (ABIM)
