| News Details |
Rain, floods, and the crisis of databases for managing water resources in Iraq
2022-11-24
Director of the Upper Euphrates Basin Developing Centre - University of Anbar
Iraq witnessed during the months of October and November good amounts of rain, which resulted in runoff rains in a number of watersheds, especially in the Western Desert region, after three consecutive years of lack of rain in winter, high temperatures and dust storms in summer, and the voices became louder and the calls for creating green belts, combating desertification, and reducing the effects of thermal changes soon faded away with the receding of the heat period and dust storms!!.
Recently (years 2018 and 2019) recurring floods occurred in many regions of Iraq with the rainy season in winter, so it was surprised to talk about a water crisis in the following summer, until the last drought wave, which lasted for three seasons, summer and winter, sounded the hazard alarm strongly.
As we indicated, with every dust storm, heat wave, or an increase in desertification and deterioration of agricultural lands, the talk about solutions will be started, reduce impacts, plant deserts and green belts, rationalize water resources consumption, and reach the limit to reduce or reduce the agricultural plan with the use of modern methods of irrigation. Despite the importance and feasibility of what is being proposed, we at the Upper Euphrates Basin Developing Centre, which is one of the research centers at the University of Anbar. Among its interests and research lines is the issue of water resources management and its sustainability as part of the university's vision and goals to achieve sustainable development. We have indicated the neglect of an important and pivotal element that could be It has the most prominent role in developing successful and efficient solutions to the problems and crises that we referred to earlier, and what is meant here are the databases of water resources, especially the Iraqi western desert region, and the valleys and valleys in the rest of Iraq in general.
Water resources and what is related to them represent the basis associated with six goals of the sustainable development goals set by the United Nations to achieve Vision 2030 and obligated the signatory countries, including Iraq, to take serious steps to achieve them. And the stammering. The first, second, third, sixth, eleventh and thirteenth goals are all related to water resources and their sustainability, in addition to many other goals that are affected by the issue of water. Therefore, the existence of a wide and accurate database of water resources can contribute significantly to the development of models to study the hydrology of the region more accurately and to work on successful, economically feasible and sustainable projects, whether they are related to the agricultural or economic aspect, natural reserves or green belts, and combating desertification.
Recognizing the importance of databases for water resources to support development projects through this data and providing it to researchers and postgraduate students, the Upper Euphrates Basin Development Center has initiated the deployment of meteorological stations in Ramadi and Haditha, with cooperation to exchange information with the management of small dams in Rutba to carry out monitoring work for levees and rainfall in Western region of Iraq. Within two months of observing, recording and exchanging data, we have the following:
The lack of integrated and accurate hydrological monitoring stations for most of the dams in the region, despite the vastness of their areas, and the presence of some stations in city centers is limited to the Euphrates River, where we noticed despite the large torrential rains in many dams, but the stations in the city centers indicated drops or small amounts that do not reflect the amounts of torrents registered.
At Ramadi station, for example, it was recorded (0.2 mm, which is a very small amount, while the Upper Euphrates Basin Development Center station recorded 11 mm for the same time period. We have noticed large amounts of rain that led to flooding in the streets and some areas, which means that there are many weather stations that need maintenance and maintenance.
In most countries of the world, times of floods and rains are an invaluable opportunity to conduct measurements and studies and provide databases that can result in the development of numerical models that can contribute to the development of concepts for water resource management systems and the development of solutions to various problems related to drought and floods and related agricultural and irrigation plans. It is not hidden from the specialists the importance of this data to develop future and strategic plans for managing the water file as the most important issues for the future of Iraq and its implications for negotiations with neighboring countries regarding the management of joint river basins.
Therefore, we call on the decision makers, the Ministry of Water Resources and the General Authority for Meteorology and Seismic Monitoring to establish and install a network of modern and advanced hydrological monitoring stations in the valleys and valleys of Iraq in general and the Western Desert in particular. There can be cooperation with the security forces from the army and deployed in various of these remote and remote areas by having these The stations are within the military units and access to them is secured to take the data, as the modern and advanced stations record detailed data stored in their electronic memory that can be emptied periodically and can provide an invaluable database for researchers and studentsDrupper rasat.
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