Ground water conference deliberated solutions

22 December, 2012

It is good to see that conferences are held regularly on one of the important challenges facing mankind not only in India but in many parts of the world and that challenge is how to make groundwater safe for use for not only for the present generation but also for the future generations.

THE FOUR-day long (Dec.18-21, 2012) conference titled, "5th International Ground Water Conference (IGWC-2012) was held in Aurangabad region of Maharashtra. This conference was jointly organised by the Maulana College of Arts, Science and Commerce; Dr Rafiq Zakaria Campus; Association of Geologists and Hydrogeologists (GEOFORUM) and International Groundwater Council (IGC). Others incollaboration were : Groundwater Survey & Development Agency (GSDA), Govt.of Maharashtra, India; UNICEF, New Delhi, India; UNESCO, New Delhi, India; International Association of Hydrological Sciences (IAHS), France; International Association of Hydrogeologgists (IAH), UK.

About 36 representatives and scientists from across the globe including the US, the UK, France, Japan, Italy, Australia and 328 from across the country including Central Groundwater Corporation, NGRI-Hyderabad, Indian Association of Hydrologists (IAH), Indian School of Mines, Groundwater Suveys and Development AGency (GSDA) and NEERI scientists attended the conference, reported The Times of India.

Based on the objectives of this conference, experts presented their research papers on different subjects and made suggestion to problems. Groundwater resources in hard rock regions with limited renewable potential have to be managed judiciously to ensure adequate supplies of dependable quantity and quality. Groundwater is a natural resource with economic, strategic and environmental value, which is under stress both due to changing climatic and anthropogenic factors.

Therefore, management strategies need to be aimed at sustenance of this limited resource. Groundwater pollution due to anthropogenic factors is very slow process with long-term impacts on carbon cycle and global climatic change on one hand and quality on the other.