RESEARCH PROJECT

Land and WaterDepartment

Development of a model for the sustainable managementof the aquifers in the Apulia Region

GESAP

Title

01/01/2010 – 01/01/2011Duration

Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio PugliaFinanced by

1. Water Research Institute - National Research Council, Italy2. CIHEAM - Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Bari, Italy3. Polytechnic of Bari, Italy

Partners

To study and estimate the aquifers withdrawals in the Apulia region;To propose protection policies in order to reduce the pressureon groundwater resources;To analyse the acceptability of the proposed protection policies by farmers; To analyse the possible existing conflicts among stakeholders;To design an innovative monitoring system for groundwater exploitation.

Specificobjectives

The main goal is to define and implement innovative management options to mitigate the environmental impacts of groundwater pumping in coastal aquifers. The case study presented is the Apulia region, Italy.

Overall objective

To prepare and submit direct interviews to the main stakeholders;To estimate the exploitation costs in each cadastral unit;To develop and analyze the Bayesian Belief Network, used to simulate the groundwater exploitation attitude of the farmers, and their reactions to the introduction of new protection policies;To contribute to the development of a GIS-based Decision Support System for the identification of the areas characterized by the higher pressure on groundwaterand the lowest degree of policy acceptability.

IAMBactivities

Projectweb page

Quantity of productionHigh 75,8Medium 20,4Low 3,81

Reduction irrigated areasYes 5,43No 94,6

Information utilityYes 60,0No 40,0

Pressure on aquiferHigh 28,1Medium 41,9Low 30,0

Satisfaction water demandFully satisfied 39,0Partially satisfied 81,0Not satisfied 0

Water provided consortiumFully provided 39,0Almost fully 81,0Almost null 0Null 0

Growndwater withdrawalFull 8,54Almost full 26,3Almost null 37,1Null 28,1

Water availabilityHigh 67,4Medium 27,8Low 4,76

Water demandHigh 70,0Medium 30,0Low 0

YeldHigh 75,2Medium 15,8Low 8,99

Quality of productionHigh 72,4Medium 10,9Low 8,66

Growndwater availabilityHigh 100Medium 0Low 0

Timeliness

Dissemination

Presence of wells

Pollutant concentration

Salinity

Cost of withdrawal

Farm dimension

Excess tresholds

Precipitation

Crops

Quantity delivered

Irrigation season

Growndwater qualityHigh 100Medium 0Low 0

Fig. 1: Example of imput data Map of the exploitation costs in Euro/m3

Fig. 2: The adopted strategy Bayesian Belief Network used to simulate the groundwater exploitation attitude of the farmers in Capitanata

Fig. 3: Main resultsInterface of the GIS-based Decision

Fig. 4: Main resultsDistribution of the acceptability degree of the proposed protection policies by farmers