Villages to get piped water are located in Sistan-Baluchestan, Khuzestan, South Khorasan, Kerman, Kohgilouyeh-Boyerahmad and Chaharmahal-Bakhtiari provinces, Mehr News Agency reported.
Despite efforts made in recent years to supply water to rural areas, about 20% of the villages across the country, home to around 8 million people, suffer from water shortages.
Currently, 99% of Iran’s urban population have access to drinking water while the figure is 82% in rural regions, which should reach 90% in the next four years.
A long-term program is underway to supply water to 7,138 villages across the country.
Costing $760 million, the project will provide drinking water to more than 3.3 million people in rural areas within 30 months.
Seeking to eliminate deprivation in underprivileged regions, the project includes the installation of more than 1,000 km of transmission lines, improvement and development of rural distribution network extending over 11,000 km, water supply with a capacity of 6,216 liters per second, the construction of 1,126 storage tanks with a capacity of 400,000 cubic meters and 449 pumping stations.