Making the invisible, visible: 3D aquifer models as an effective tool for building water stewardship in Maharashtra, India

Eshwer Kale,Sarita Chemburkar,Marcella D'Souza

doi:10.2166/wp.2022.210

Abstract

Abstract Frequent droughts, growing water demand, and the ease of accessing groundwater, particularly through boreholes, have led to an over-dependence on groundwater to meet notably agricultural demands in India. This has led the Watershed Organisation Trust (WOTR) to motivate and capacitate rural communities for ‘water stewardship’ in which the village as a whole comes together to learn about its resources to manage them better. However, improving the management of the water resource is challenging as the general perception is that the water found below one's farm belongs to the landowner. Moreover, what is below the surface is not visible, therefore not well understood. Thus, WOTR designed a water stewardship initiative (WSI) with the Community-Driven Visual Integrator (CoDriVE-VI or CDVI) as one of the important tools; it produces an operational 3D map of the local aquifer. WOTR implemented the WSI in villages in Maharashtra, India. This paper evaluates the impacts and potential of the WSI and CDVI. We observed that the visual effect of these 3D models of aquifers helps local communities and farmers better understand and appreciate groundwater as a shared resource. This tool is effective in promoting water stewardship, achieving behavioural change in water users, and helping implement groundwater laws and policies.

Highlights

Groundwater is a most crucial component of the water resource as it constitutes about two-thirds of the world’s freshwater resources (Chilton, 1992)
The Community-Driven Visual Integrator (CDVI) tool was applied in 25 villages that were especially groundwaterstressed, out of the 100 villages, along with the overall water stewardship initiative (WSI) activities, with the aim to enhance groundwater literacy and mobilise communities for aquifer management
Since groundwater plays a major role in the livelihoods of rural households, it is essential to bring people together who share an aquifer for its appropriate management

Summary

Introduction

Groundwater is a most crucial component of the water resource as it constitutes about two-thirds of the world’s freshwater resources (Chilton, 1992). It is broadly described as the world’s ‘hidden treasure’: an invisible resource that provides safe drinking water and livelihood security to millions of people in arid regions (Chevalking et al, 2008). A precious and life-saving resource, groundwater has for decades faced multiple challenges at different levels, in its management and regulation. The groundwater resource is challenging to manage because of its invisible nature and the belief that groundwater is a private resource, which leads to its over-use and the drastic decline in groundwater levels. Besides the further development of available resources, proper groundwater management requires attention on the judicious utilisation of the resource to ensure their long-term availability

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Conclusion