The International Groundwater Resources Assessment Centre and Transboundary Aquifers

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The International Groundwater Resources
Assessment Centreand Transboundary Aquifers
Jac van der GunUNESCO-ISARM-MED Consultative
MeetingThessaloniki 21-23 October 2004
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Groundwater an extremely important natural
resource
Groundwater

• A large share of the worlds drinking and
  industrial water supplies depends on it

It is a major source of irrigation water,
particularly in arid zones
It may keep wetlands sustainable
It controls land subsidence and other
environmental processes
It may bridge dry periods when surface water is
lacking
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Groundwater a vulnerable resource,often with
links to the environment
Groundwater

• Lowering water-tables
• Exhaustion of groundwater storage
• Groundwater pollution
• Sea water intrusion
• Salt water upconing
• Land subsidence
• Baseflow reduction
• Wetland degradation etc.

Controlling such problems requires effective
groundwater resources management. For that
purpose, adequate information and knowledge on
groundwater are needed...
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Rationale for an international centre for
groundwater resources

• Groundwater is
• extremely important,
• often highly vulnerable and
• sometimes difficult to develop

• Therefore, groundwater needs to be managed, in
  the first place at the local level

• Activities at a supra-national or global level
  may create very significant additional value
• management of transboundary aquifers
• internationally consistent data collection and
  monitoring
• benefit from knowledge gained under similar
  conditions
• understanding regional or global processes and
  patterns
• promoting groundwater in water resources planning

This is why IGRAC has been established
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What is IGRAC?

• An initiative of UNESCO and WMO (1999)
• Principle global sharing of information and
  knowledge for optimal and sustainable groundwater
  resources development and management
• Centre with a non-commercial profile
• Hosted by the Netherlands Institute of Applied
  Geoscience TNO at Utrecht, The Netherlands
• Operating under auspices of UNESCO and WMO
• Receiving financial support from the Dutch
  government for the initial years
• Developing activities since early 2003

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Scope of activities

• Establishing a web-based Global Groundwater
  Information System (GGIS)

• Producing and promoting guidelines and protocols
  for adequate groundwater data acquisition and
  groundwater monitoring

• Co-operating in global/regional projectsor
  programmes with a significant groundwater
  component

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Structure for Global Groundwater Information
System (GGIS)
Map of countries and groundwater regions of the
world (spatial units)
Global overview
Standard set of lumped attributes for each of
the spatial units
Selected information on groundwater systems or
themes
Detailed ground- water info
Standardised documentation on gw systems or themes
Meta-information on groundwater
Services and enabling environ- ment
Web-enabled discussion forums collaborative
environment
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GGIS Global Overview modules
Overviewing or comparing selected lumped
attributes per administrative unit ...
..or per groundwater region ...
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Global Overview
GGIS
Country X Total area 4,000,000
km2 Population 16.5 million Mean annual
rainfall 340 mm Dominant aquifer rock
limestone Hydraulic aquifer class fissured Mean
aquifer thickness 70 m Mean depth to gwater
20 m Gwater abstraction 2,502 million
m3/a Gwater quality medium to poor Main gw
problems salinity, overdraft etc.
1. Show a list of attributes for country (or
region) X
.
. Information links within GGIS
Thematic analysis Meta information Discussion
Fora Collaborative Env.
2. Show meta information for country (region) X
and any other dedicated links to other parts
of the GGIS
3. Show all countries meeting a certain set of
criteria (search for analogies)
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GGIS
Global Overview Attributes

• More than 70 attributes, divided in the following
  categories
• Physiography
• Demography
• Agriculture and economics
• Aquifer characteristics
• Groundwater quantity
• Groundwater quality
• Groundwater use
• Groundwater problems
• Groundwater management

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Global Overview on-line
GGIS
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Global Overview on-line (2)
GGIS
both country and groundwater region based
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GGIS
Groundwater Regions
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visualization in Global Overview
reveals patterns
GGIS
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visualization in Global Overview
reveals patterns
GGIS
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from Global Overview towards Detailed
Information
GGIS
Fluoride
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GGIS
Collaborative Environment
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GGIS
Collaborative Environment
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GGIS
Meta Information Moduleon-line
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Scope of activities

• Producing and promoting guidelines and protocols
  for adequate groundwater data acquisition and
  groundwater monitoring

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Guidelines and Protocols (GP)
Global Inventory of 1. guidelines
protocols 2. monitoring practices
Reports on 1. guidelines and protocols 2.
monitoring practices
Planning new (updates of) guidelines and protocols
Improved access to guidelines and protocols (web
site)
International working groups
New or updated guidelines and protocols
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Online database
Guidelines and Protocols
GP

• contains over 400 document titles, classified
  into 8 categories
• informs about author(s), purpose, contents, scope
  etc.
• provides internet links to the documents

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Scope of activities

• Co-operating in global/regional projectsor
  programmes with a significant groundwater
  component

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Co-operation of IGRAC in international
projects/programmes

• World Hydrogeological Map (WHYMAP)
• World Water Development Report (UN-WWAP)
• IAH commissions e.g. ISARM (Iullemeden, etc..)
• IW LEARN (GEF)
• AQUASTRESS (EU)
• GRAPHICS (UNESCO)
• ...

IGRAC is exploring additional opportunities for
cooperation with international non-profit
organisations...
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Transboundary aquifers and IGRAC
IGRACs mission, capabilities and means
Needs of transboundary aquifer teams or
supporting organizations/ projects
Matching process
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What roles may IGRAC play regarding
transboundary aquifers?

• Providing collaborative platform facilities to
  transboundary aquifer teams
• Facilitating tools for easily sharing information
  within a team
• Promoting and facilitating exchange of experience
  between different teams
• Contributing to public awareness on the needs and
  the practicalities of transboundary aquifer
  management

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IGRAC intends to support existing teams and
organizations involved in shared aquifers

• Iullemeden project (OSS, ISARM, GEF)
• IW-LEARN (GEF)
• ISARM agreement for co-operation
• SADC region SIMDAS (Gov.UK, UNESCO, SADC
  countries)

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Tentative elements in the short term of ISARM -
IGRAC co-operation

• IGRAC
• Organizing a special web page for each of ISARMs
  regional networks
• Providing collaborative environment facilities to
  each of these networks, in particular Digital
  Workspace
• Development of regional databases with web based
  visualization facilities

• ISARM
• Providing information on regional teams and
  projects
• Providing data from regional inventories
• Communicate on further developments that may
  benefit from IGRAC involvement, e.g. toolkit for
  sound management of shared aquifers

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Questions about IGRAC?

• Visit www.igrac.nl , or
• contact one of IGRACs staff members

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www.IGRAC.nl invites you...
Thank you !