Groundwater demand management at local scale in rural areas of India: a strategy to ensure water well sustainability based on aquifer diffusivity and community participation

Watershed development programmes provide an opportunity for sustainable management strategies, although currently, they remain largely supply-side mechanisms of water resources development. Hydrogeological conditions, community participation and status of groundwater usage are important in evolving strategies on demand-side groundwater management.Neemkheda aquifer is a typical low-storage, low-hydraulic conductivity aquifer from a watershed in the dryland regions of Madhya Pradesh State of central India. A shallow unconfined aquifer, it consists of an upper coarse, calcareous sandstone unit underlain by a fine-grained sandstone unit. A well commune of seven wells is poised to test the concept of joint groundwater management, wherein wells are mechanisms of tapping a common water source, the Neemkheda aquifer.The strategy for systematic groundwater management in the Neemkheda well commune is based upon the relationship between Transmissivity (T) and Storage coefficient (S), i.e. aquifer diffusivity, and its variation within the aquifer. Wells within a high diffusivity domain tend to dewater more quickly than wells within a low diffusivity domain. A well-use schedule during the dry season, based upon aquifer diffusivity forms the basis of the groundwater management concept. The distribution of local aquifer diffusivities governs the relationship between local and regional aquifer depletion times and forms the basis of the groundwater management exercise being proposed for the Neemkheda aquifer.

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Resumen Los programas de desarrollo de una cuenca hídrica son una oportunidad para el uso de estrategias de gestión sostenible, aunque hoy en día estas siguen siendo principalmente mecanismos para el desarrollo de recursos hídricos con énfasis en la oferta. Las condiciones hidrogeológicas, la participación comunitaria y la condición de utilización del agua subterránea, son importantes en el desarrollo de estrategias para la gestión del agua subterránea, desde el punto de vista de la demanda.El acuífero de Neemkheda es un acuífero típico de almacenamiento bajo y conductividad hidráulica baja, perteneciente a una cuenca hídrica ubicada en las regiones secas del Estado de Madhya Pradesh, en la parte central de India. Un acuífero de tipo libre, somero, formado por una unidad superior de arenisca calcárea de grano grueso, subyacida por una unidad de arenisca de grano fino.Un campo de pozos comunitario compuesto por siete pozos, pone a prueba el concepto de gestión conjunta del agua subterránea, dentro del cual los pozos son mecanismos para usar una fuente de agua común: El acuífero de Neemkheda.La estrategia usada para la gestión sistemática del agua subterránea, en el campo de pozos comunitario de Neemkheda, se basa en la relación existente entre Transmisividad (T) y Coeficiente de Almacenamiento (S), es decir en la Difusividad del Acuífero y en su variación observada dentro del mismo acuífero. Los pozos cuya difusividad esta dentro de un rango alto, tienden a experimentar un descenso en su nivel mas rápidamente que aquellos pozos con una difusividad baja. El concepto de gestión de agua subterránea se basa en un programa especial de operación para cada pozo durante la estación seca, el cual a su vez se basa en la difusividad del acuífero. La distribución de difusividades locales del acuífero rige las relaciones entre las épocas de descensos de nivel en el acuífero a escala regional y local, y además constituyen la base del ejercicio de la gestión del agua subterránea que se esta proponiendo para el acuífero de Neemkheda.

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Résumé Les programmes de développement des bassins versants offrent une occasion de développer des stratégies pour une gestion durable, bien qu à présent elles restent en grande mesure le terme source dans le mécanisme de développement de la ressource en eau. Les conditions hydrogéologiques, la participation de la communauté et lusage des eaux souterraines sont importants pour le terme demande dans les stratégies de gestion des eaux souterraines. Laquifère de Neemkheda presents des caractéristiques typiques pour un bassin versant dans les régions arides de létat Madhya Pradesh de lInde centrale en ce qui concerne les faible valeurs de la conductivité hydraulique et du coéfficient demmagasinement. Il sagit dun aquifère phrèatique dont la partie supérieure est constitué par des grès calcaire qui restent sur des grés plus fins. Afin dessayer le concept de gestion integrée, on a réalisé dans laquifère de Neemkheda un captage ayant sept forages qui forment la ressource en eau communale. La stratégie de la gestion systématique du captage est basée sur la relation entre la transmissivité (T), le coéfficient demmagasinement (S), donc la diffusivité hydraulique ainsi que sa variation spatiale. Les puits forés dans les zones à grande diffusivité tendent à sassècher plus vite que ceux creusés dans des zones à faible diffusivité. Le concept de la gestion des eaux souterraines est donc basé sur la distribution spatiale des diffusivités. À partir de ce concept on a développé un programme dexploitation des forages pendant les saisons sèches. La relation entre les temps d épuissment locaux et régionaux est determiné par la distribution spatiale de la diffusivitée et forme la base de lexercice sur la gestion des eaux proposée pour laquifère de Neemkheda.

     

Ethnic enterprises and community development

Ethnic enterprises are growing rapidly in urban areas across the United States. Anecdotal evidence from around the country reports many success stories of how ethnic businesses transform communities; however, researchers have not provided a systematic review of the role of ethnic businesses in community developing. In practice, ethnic businesses have not been formally incorporated in local planning and development process. This article provides a systematic review of the multi-faceted ways ethnic businesses contribute to community building and neighborhood development. In addition to surveying the current literature, we also chose three communities for a focused review: Buford Highway in Atlanta, Monterey Park in Los Angeles, and Sunset Park in New York. A framework is developed to evaluate the economic, physical, social/cultural, and political effects that ethnic businesses exert on communities. We find that ethnic businesses can serve local economic interests and community-level cohesion and accrue economic, social, physical, and political benefits to their respective communities. These include serving the unmet market needs of certain neighborhoods and households, creating job opportunities and generating revenues, revitalizing and fueling the commercial development of abandoned communities, organizing and promoting social life and cultural diversity, as well as contributing their collective interest and voice in local communities. We argue that ethnic businesses should be better incorporated into urban policies in community economic development.     

Campus sustainability at the edges: Emotions,relations, and bio-cultural connections

The university campus is often considered a key site for the development of environmental sustainability initiatives. At the same time, the concept and practice of sustainability has been critiqued for its lack of conceptual clarity and its proneness to co-optation by neoliberal institutions and organizations. Using a just sustainabilities framework, this article strives to respond to this tension by exploring the possibility of a campus sustainability at the edges, one that is interested in engaging the broader socio-spatial context of a university as well as in tapping into the emotional and relational realms of fostering more sustainable socio-ecological assemblages. Through a case study analysis of the Philadelphia Urban Creators (PUC), a youth-led organization operating within the Temple University-North Philadelphia interface, I find that grassroots sustainability actors possess important knowledge for understanding how sustainability can be a tool for restoring emotional affinity with the environment as well as for enacting transformative socio-ecological change in the urban university context and beyond. Through these explorations, my purpose is twofold: (1) to envision a more diverse, inclusive, and meaningful campus sustainability model that seeks to confront urban crises such as gentrification, racialized poverty, and mass incarceration, and (2) to incorporate emotion and affect geographies into the just sustainabilities research agenda.     

地下水可持续开发:概念、原理与方法

水均衡是众所周知的原理,但是它的应用却常常引发很多争议.争议之一就是应用水均衡方程确定地下水的安全开采量和可持续开采量.对于地下水的天然补给量存在两种截然不同的误解:一种认为,如果地下水的开采量没有超过天然补给量,那么开采地下水就是安全的;另一种则认为,地下水的可持续开采量仅仅取决于地下水的捕获量,而与天然补给量无关.事实上,地下水的天然补给量和捕获量共同决定了地下水的安全开采量或可持续开采量.本文阐明了围绕水均衡的争议,并用水均衡方程剖析了安全开采量和可持续开采量的概念.文中对可持续开采量的定义进行了详细的解释,对实现地下水可持续开发的方法进行了总结.其中,地下水数值模拟模型和模拟-优化模型是确定地下水可持续开发方案的最有效的工具,文中也对这两个模型进行了简单的回顾.     

Zimbabwe: a country rich in geological history

A holiday in Zimbabwe provided the opportunity to examine some of the rocks, many of Archaean age, in one of the geologically most interesting parts of the world. Here, a great deal of the Earth's geological history can be unravelled.     

The rural sector in the development prospects and problems of a typical African country — Nigeria

This paper begins by theoretically presenting the rural sector of developing countries in a national development context. The critical role of the sector is highlighted and the system effects of inadequate equipment of the sector for such role are considered. The Nigerian situation is used to illustrate the prospects and the problems of the rural sector in most African countries. Remedial policy measures are shown to lie mainly in the provision of infrastructural facilities, in forging effective linkage relationships with the urban sector and in rural economy diversification towards a nationally beneficial integrated development.     

Development through football in Africa: Neoliberal and postcolonial models of community development

Informed by academic writings on non-governmental organisations (NGOs), critiques of neoliberal development, and postcolonial development theory, this paper explores the relationship between football and development through critical analysis of two contrasting initiatives. One is the Football for Hope Movement (FHM), which was the principal backer of the official campaign of the 2010 FIFA World Cup (FWC), called “20 Centres for 2010”. The second is the Katina 2009 football tournament held under the auspices of a community development project in Uganda sponsored by the Guardian newspaper and Barclays bank in the UK.The initial aim was to identify the particular development models at work within ‘development through football’ initiatives. While an established model of NGO-led community development is certainly apparent, different initiatives suggest a basic distinction between neoliberal and postcolonial variants. The paper identifies and explains the differences while showing how contrasting models become sites of struggle and overlap, to some extent, when translated into development practice. Ultimately, the investigation reveals how football is used as a magnet to draw young people deeper into the operational orbit of NGOs and their donors. The paper also draws attention to new actors and partnerships in international development – most notably the Guardian, whose transformation into a development actor suggests a novel ‘NGO-isation’ of the media itself.     

Croatia — a coastal and maritime country

Croatia, through its geographic position, is a Mediterranean/Adriatic and Central European/Danube state. As an Adriatic coastal state, it has a long maritime tradition, which is apparent in its well-developed shipping (2.4 million GT), the high-quality ship-building industry (among the top six in the world) and through its numerous sea ports, of which many were established in ancient times. The leading national port is Rijeka, which is at the same time an important transit port for Austria, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic.The exceptionally indented Croatian Adriatic coast with its attractive archipelagos and favorable climatic and oceanographic conditions in the coastal sea offers very advantageous conditions for comprehensive tourist utilization. This is particularly true of nautical tourism, which is complimented by a larger number of constructed and well-equipped yachting ports/marinas on the coast and islands.     

Amenity migration to the global south: Implications for community development

Despite a growing trend of migration to countries in the global South fueled by their natural amenities (i.e., natural amenity migration), research on this topic has predominantly been conducted in the global North. This is problematic given the notable socioeconomic, attitudinal, and behavioral differences between amenity migrants (often urbanites from developed countries) and local people (often rural residents of developing countries). Grounded in community field theory, this study begins to fill this gap in the literature by increasing our understanding of the ways in which local residents and amenity migrants interact in the amenity-rich community of Nuevo Arenal, Costa Rica. We found that linguistic, cultural, and spatial barriers (real and perceived) created a social climate in which the interaction between local residents and amenity migrants was primarily based on mundane interactions and did not lead to social integration. This proved to be a hindrance to the creation of the community field, which led to a lack of joint planning and participation in activities and projects that sought to improve the overall living conditions in the community. Explanations of these findings and the implications of such a divide are offered.     

区调提速的紧迫性和可行性

区域地质调查（区调）是国家重要的基础性工作。近年来，随着我国经济、社会的快速发，调整区调工作布局，加快区调工作步伐已迫在眉睫。本从国民经济、社会发展的需求和国家“十五”计划的要求出发，分析了全国区调工作的现状和发展趋势，对依靠科技进步，调整区调部署、加快区调进度的紧迫性、可行性及目标任务进行了论述，指出了尽快将区调工作纳入全面服务社会的轨道、2005年优先安排并完成青藏高原空白区1；25万区调工作、2010年前全面完成全国中比例尺区调任务并出版中国第一套相关基础地质系列图件的基本思路。章特别指出，区调提速一定要确保野外填图的质量，工作部署一定要坚持实事求是的原则。要依靠计算机、遥感等高新技术实现区调提速，要在提速过程中实现区调工作主流程的信息化。     

Low-cost airlines in Europe: Reconciling liberalization and sustainability

This paper addresses the contradictions inherent in the interconnections between air transport liberalization and the economic and environmental dimensions to sustainability from the particular perspective of the dynamic expansion of European low-cost carriers and their networks. The argument considers the incompatibility of environmental sustainability with a business model that promotes rapid growth in air travel without meeting its external costs, but, simultaneously, claims to be socially and geographically inclusive. Moreover, that growth is perceived to be advantageous to strategies promoting national and regional economic growth and, consequently, the provision of low-cost airline services is being promoted by an array of national and local government agencies throughout the European Union. The paper concludes that the low-cost model does not account for its externalities despite air transport being the most environmentally damaging form of transport per passenger-kilometer but is clearly important to economic development at a variety of scales.     

The real country and the legal country: Spanish Ideals and mayan realities in colonial Guatemala

Conquest by imperial Spain forced the Maya of Guatemala to contend with a dizzying array of European values and culturally-impregnated modes of geographic thought. Fundamentally different notions of where and how to live were thrust upon Maya communities by the policy of resettlement known as congregación. Imperial legislation evokes a utopian existence nowhere attained in the realm of actual practice. Archival documents, many of them penned by disenchanted clergy and concerned Crown officials, portray a lived experience quite unlike that enshrined in decrees and ordinances, edicts and commands. For the colonial Maya, as for natives throughout the Americas, the geography of everyday life bore little resemblance to the idealized arrangements of people in place promoted by imperial rhetoric.     

Recharge and sustainability of a coastal aquifer in northern Albania

The River Mati in Albania has formed a coastal plain with Holocene and Pleistocene sediments. The outer portion of the plain is clay, with three underlying aquifers that are connected to an alluvial fan at the entry of the river into the plain. The aquifers supply water for 240,000 people. Close to the sea the aquifers are brackish. The brackish water is often artesian and found to be thousands of years old. Furthermore, the salinity, supported by δ¹⁸O results, does not seem to be due to mixing with old seawater but due to diffusion from intercalated clay layers. Heavy metals from mines in the upstream section of River Mati are not an immediate threat, as the pH buffering of the river water is good. Moreover, the heavy metals are predominantly found in suspended and colloidal phases. Two sulphur isotope signatures, one mirroring seawater sulphate in the brackish groundwater (δ³⁴S >21 ‰) and one showing the influence of sulphide in the river and the fresh groundwater (δ³⁴S <10 ‰), indicate that the groundwater in the largest well field is recharged from the river. The most serious threat is gravel extraction in the alluvial fan, decreasing the hydraulic head necessary for recharge and causing clogging of sediments.     

全面推进我国建设项目管理和工程总承包事业的发展--王素卿司长在第二届建设项目管理和工程总承包经验交流暨表彰大会上的讲话

一、要大力推行工程项目管理和工程总承包 我国在相当长的时期内实行计划经济体制。在计划经济体制下，固定资产投资项目具有投资结构单一、建设项目管理模式单一、参与建设的单位功能单一的特点。     

Handicrafts in Oman and their role in rural community development

Oman has a long tradition of practising handicrafts, though few are of high aesthetic value. Omani handicrafts have always been functional, made for a rural population which has valued the artefacts for what they do but much less for their appearance. Nevertheless, handicraft skills are very widespread throughout the rural population. In the past they have been used to process raw materials of agricultural origin, notably from the date palm and from livestock, and also from wild trees and minerals. In addition to local resources, Omani craftsmen have worked imported cotton yarn and imported precious and semi-precious metals. The craftsmen not only provided equipment for rural producers and finished goods for domestic use but they also performed the important community roles of linking primary producer with primary producer and consumer, and making both more aware of the raw materials of the environment in which they lived. In doing this, craftsmen, with their mutually respected skills, played a vital role in creating the complex network of interdependencies from which a community is built. However, the Omani and other regional oil industries put great pressure on all rural activities, and particularly on the highly labour-intensive crafts. People sought work in the urban centres and in the armed forces at the same time as a flood of cheap imports prevented craftsmen from raising their prices to keep abreast of inflation and of heightened personal material aspirations. The impact of oil was so rapid that the craftsmen had no time to adapt their techniques or their products to meet the new circumstances. Craft growth and change needed government support to see it through a difficult transitional period. Unfortunately, however, the government of Oman has only played a small and somewhat confused role in the crafts. Many people can no longer practise their inherited skills and the role that they played in maintaining the community has been largely destroyed. Concentrated effort needs to be made, craft by craft, initially at a village scale, to train and to modify techniques where necessary and to expand market openings. Success in a single village can then form the basis of expanded regional or national projects, drawing in other resources such as credit from the Agricultural Bank and using the marketing networks of the Central Marketing Authority. An approach which has been used to redevelop spinning and weaving and to introduce irrigation channel manufacture in a coastal village in northern Oman is providing valuable information that could be used as the basis of other craft projects in Oman and in countries with comparable craft development problems.     

Profitability and the poor: Corporate strategies, innovation and sustainability

Based on empirical evidence, the article looks at the implications of private sector participation (PSP) for the delivery of water supply and sanitation to the urban and peri-urban poor in developing countries, with particular reference to Africa and Latin America. More precisely, the article addresses the impact produced by multinational companies’ (MNCs) strategies, in light of the pursuit of profitability, on the extension of connections to the pipeline network. It does so by questioning the assumptions that greater private sector efficiency and innovation, together with contract design, will enable the sustainable extension of service coverage to low income dwellers. The strategies of the major water MNCs are considered both in relation to the global expansion of their operations and the adjustment of local strategies to commercial considerations. The latter might result in identifying profitable markets, modifying contractual provisions, attempting to reduce costs and increase income, reducing risks and exiting from non-performing contracts. The evidence reviewed allows for re-assessing the relative roles of the public and private sectors in extending and delivering water services to the poor. First, the most far reaching innovative approaches to extending connections are more likely to come from communities, public authorities and political activity than from MNCs. Secondly, whenever MNCs are liable to exit from non-profitable contracts, the public sector has no other option than to deal with external risks affecting continuity of provision. Finally, market limitations affecting MNCs’ ability to serve marginal populations and access cheap capital do not apply to well-organised, politically led public sector undertakings.     

Application of fragility curves to estimate building damage and economic loss at a community scale: a case study of Seaside,Oregon

Community-scale estimates of building damage and economic loss are modeled for Seaside, Oregon, for Cascadia subduction zone events ranging from 8.7 to 9.3 M_W with corresponding slip distances of 3–25 m considering only the effects of the tsunami. Numerical simulations are obtained from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s method of splitting tsunami model which includes a source model, subsidence, and calculations of the propagation and inundation flow characteristics. The damage estimates are based on fragility curves from the literature which relate flow depth with probability of damage for two different structural materials of buildings. Calculations are performed at the parcel level for the inundation hazard without including damage caused by the earthquake itself. Calculations show that the severity of building damage in Seaside is sensitive to the magnitude of the event or degree of slip because the majority of the city is located on low-lying coastal land within the estimated inundation zone. For the events modeled, the percentage of building within the inundation zone ranges from 9 to 88 %, with average direct economic losses ranging from $2 million to $1.2 billion.     

Quantify the landscape effect and environmental sustainability of rural region planning at town scale near metropolis

The urban fringe, which can be seen as a special form of regional ecosystem with a spatial transition from urban to rural areas, has strong heterogeneity and is a typical ecologically sensitive area. The expansion of cities and the landscape effect of the changes have attracted wide attention. The primary aim of this study is to obtain an understanding of the spatial patterns of landscape conversion and the corresponding environmental sustainability. With the help of GIS and Fragstats software, the changes of landscape patterns before and after town planning were compared in An-Ding town of Beijing, of which the sustainability was also revealed based on the ecological footprint using social and economic statistic data. The results showed that the landscape pattern changed greatly during its conversion from several villages to a small town and the landscape fragmentation increased due to road construction. Meanwhile, human disturbance increased with the constructed land extension. For the gap between the ecological footprint and the biological capacity, An-Ding town ran an ecological deficit at that period, which means it was unsustainable. However, the environmental sustainability decreased after planning due to the degraded green land and forest. The results suggested that ecological management should be strengthened during the town planning period.