TEHRAN– On Monday, Ilam’s tourism chief publicized a cultural heritage project aimed to restore some ancient qanats stretched in the western Iranian province.

“A selection of qanats will be restored soon in a bid to restore water flow to agricultural lands of the region,” Farzad Sharifi said.

The official made the remarks during a field visit to historical qanats situated in the Amirabad region of Mehran, CHTN reported.

For thousands of years, Qanat systems, as masterpieces of ancient Iranians, supplied water to agricultural and permanent settlements in arid regions, tapping alluvial aquifers at the heads of valleys and conducting the water along underground tunnels by gravity, often over many kilometers.

“One of those historical qanats, which dates back to the Safavid era, could be supplying adequate water to surrounding lands if it is revived to a former state,” the official said.

Apart from agriculture, the project seeks to help revive segments of Ilam’s cultural heritage, the official said.

The concept of “Persian Qanat” was registered on the UNESCO World Heritage list in 2016, representing a selection of eleven aqueducts across Iran.

According to UNESCO, such underground aqueducts provide exceptional testimony to cultural traditions and civilizations in desert areas with an arid climate.

The qanat system relies on snow-fed streams, which flow down the foothills of surrounding mountains channeling through sloping aqueducts, often over far distances to discharge into local cisterns.

AFM