Aquifers Know No Boundaries… But Farmers Do! So, Who Should Care?!

Abstract

Human endeavours are largely governed by “boundaries”, seen and unseen. Our social interactions are subject to boundaries that are set in cultural norms: certain activities are permitted and maybe encouraged, others are accepted but not encouraged, and yet others are completely taboo. Our perception of the world around us is also governed by boundaries though some of these may be very blurred boundaries.

Just as our daily lives are governed by boundaries, so our study of science is full of boundaries, explicit and implicit—for instance, the boundary between the science of biology and physics which was once rigid and is now very blurred. This chapter stems from discussions that took place in the 4th International Symposium hosted by the Research Institute for Humanity and Nature in Kyoto, Japan, on The Dilemma of Boundaries—Towards a New Concept of the Catchment, and particularly from the discussion that related boundaries in aquifers to the boundaries that a farmer might respect in his use of water in aquifers. Reflection on this dilemma suggests that it is us humans that need to make “boundaries” in a natural world, which is in fact a continuum, and exists in a smooth transition, from one state to the next.

In making a study of the Rum-Saq Aquifer system (Puri, Aquifers know no boundaries, Guest Commentary in Journal of International Groundwater Technology, p 6, 1997), the present author stated that, “aquifers know no boundaries” (except hydraulic ones) because it became clear that the area of study that initially was only several hundreds of square kilometres had to be extended to several thousand square kilometres. The experience gained from that study led the author to be a proponent of the study of transboundary aquifers, which has now been recognised through a UN resolution that encourages countries that possess transboundary aquifers to refer in their approach to these aquifers to Draft Articles prepared by the International Law Commission and grounded in legal formulations. This chapter addresses the conceptualisation of boundaries, their characterisation and their calculation.