The spatial and temporal variability of the hydro-climate as well as land use and land cover (LULC) changes are among the most challenging problems facing water resources management. Understanding the interaction between climate variability, land use and land cover changes and their links to hydrology, river morphology and ecohydrology in the Dinder and Rahad basins in Sudan is confronted by the lack of climatic, hydrological and ecological data.
This book investigated the impacts of land degradation on the Dinder and Rahad hydrology and morphology, and interlinkage to the ecohydrological system of the Dinder National Park (DNP) in Sudan. It used an ensemble of techniques to improve our understanding of the hydrological processes and LULC changes in these basins. This included long-term trend analysis of hydroclimatic variables, LULC changes analysis, field measurements, rainfall-runoff modelling, hydrodynamic and morphological modelling of the Dinder river and its floodplain, with special focus on the Mayas wetlands. Moreover, this research is the first study to investigate the eco-hydrology of the DNP. It is expected that the results of the study will be beneficial to all stakeholders concerned and support decision-making processes for better management of water resources and ecosystem conservation in the area and possibly beyond. ... Read more

Climate change (CC), as predicted by several global climate models, is very likely to have severe impacts in the future, on top of all other global changes. These impacts may have significant influence on natural resources especially surface and groundwater. This influence is particularly problematic for the Mediterranean coastal areas, and especially the northern Nile Delta Aquifer (NDA), where both natural and socio-economic resources of significant values are located. Moreover, population increase and development imperatives create additional pressure on the available water resources. These conditions may eventually lead to insufficient coverage of the needed water demands for agriculture, domestic usage as well as urban and industrial development,
unless adaptation and mitigation measures are developed ahead of time. ... Read more

This study presents a multi-disciplinary approach for investigating the interactions between groundwater and surface water in the semi-arid Hailiutu catchment in the Erdos Plateau, Northwest China. The study consists of statistical detection of river flow regime shifts at the basin level; multiple in-situ measurements for quantifying groundwater discharges using hydraulic, hydrochemical and temperature methods at a local scale; analysis and simulation of impacts of different land use scenarios on groundwater and surface water interactions at the subcatchment scale; and the quantification of temporal and spatial groundwater and surface water interactions with hydrochemical tracers and modelling methods at the basin scale. The study found that the river flow consists of mainly groundwater discharges at all scales. The river flow regime has been intensively altered by human activities, such as the construction of reservoirs, water diversion, groundwater exploitation, and reforestation. Water use by plants and crops consumes majority of the precipitation. Groundwater sustains vegetation growth and feeds river discharges. The water resources and ecosystem management priority should reduce evaporative water uses by promoting dry resistant plant species for vegetating sand dunes and lower irrigation demand crops for socio-economic development. Furthermore, the Hailiutu River catchment must manage the groundwater recharge for water resource conservation and the maintenance of healthy ecosystems ... Read more

Ungauged catchments can be found in many parts of the world, but particularly in sub-Saharan Africa. Information collected in a gauged catchment and its regionalisation to ungauged areas is crucial for water resources assessment. Especially farmers in semi-arid zones are in need of such information. Inter and Intra-seasonal rainfall variability is large in these areas, and farmers depend more and more on additional surface and groundwater resources for their crop production. As a result, understanding the key-hydrological processes, and determination of the frequencies and magnitudes of stream flows, is very important for local food production. This is particularly true for the ungauged Makanya catchment in Tanzania, which is the subject of this study. ... Read more