(MENAFN- Wadsam) The
Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit (AREU) today launched its recent research Issues Paper, 'Surface
Groundwater Interaction in the Kabul Region Basin', authored by Dr Najibullah
Sadid and generously funded by the European Union (EU). This paper is part of
the EU three-pronged research effort into essential areas of Natural Resources
Management (NRM) project.
The
paper quantifies the groundwater recharge rates in central Kabul, upper
Kabul/Paghman, Logar, Shamali and Panjsher sub-basins. The study applies three
approaches such basin-scale water budget balance, river reach length water
balance and groundwater mounding, using Hantush's groundwater growth equation
to estimate the water surplus/deficit, transmission losses through riverbeds
and groundwater recharge rates, respectively.
'This research is very timely and
critical as we are currently facing serious shortage of groundwater across the
country. I hope this paper contributes to better policy planning and opens up
the broader space to see how different stakeholders can assist in saving our
groundwater,' said Dr Orzala Nemat, the AREU
Director. 'I am taking this
opportunity to acknowledge the full support of the government of the Islamic
Republic of Afghanistan, in particular the Ministry of Water and Energy and
their teams for the provision of technical equipment which made this study
possible,' she added.
According to this research-based
paper, the Groundwater Mounding (GWM) results show a wide spectrum range of
recharge rate variations by a maximum of two orders of magnitude for water
years 2004 to 2013. The bulk of the groundwater recharge occurs from October to
May; however, Paghman, Shakar-Dara and Istalif rivers have shown an extended
recharge period from September to July as a result of additional mountain-front
recharge.
To utilize the limited recharge
period, this paper recommends policy changes including in urban
planning/ town planning in
adapting water permeable pavements, having river training works allowing
optimal bank filtration, and establishing additional recharge basins for
surface and subsurface recharge.
In the past two decades,
groundwater — as the primary water supply source for Kabul residents — has been
extensively exploited, causing large drawdowns. The imbalance between
groundwater recharge and groundwater use is considered as a key driver for the
extreme decline in groundwater. On the other hand, the rapid increase in
urbanisation has further limited the marginal share of groundwater regeneration
from the surface; hence, the rivers and streams remain the main sources for
recharging groundwater.
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