{"id":6454,"date":"2019-11-08T07:54:14","date_gmt":"2019-11-08T04:54:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/africasustainabilitymatters.com\/?p=6454"},"modified":"2026-01-11T05:30:40","modified_gmt":"2026-01-11T05:30:40","slug":"groundwater-can-prevent-drought-emergencies-in-the-horn-of-africa-heres-how","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/2019\/11\/08\/groundwater-can-prevent-drought-emergencies-in-the-horn-of-africa-heres-how\/","title":{"rendered":"Groundwater Can Prevent Drought Emergencies In The Horn Of Africa. Here\u2019s How"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>By Evan Thomas <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Millions of people living in the arid regions of the Horn of\nAfrica&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0048969719306941?via%3Dihub#bbb0190\">lack<\/a>&nbsp;safe,\nreliable and affordable water&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0048969719306941?via%3Dihub#bbb0250\">throughout<\/a>&nbsp;the\nyear. This is&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/journals.ametsoc.org\/doi\/10.1175\/BAMS-D-15-00106.1\">because of<\/a>&nbsp;recent\ndecreases in rainfall in the drought-prone Horn of Africa, rising water demands\nand persistent challenges in maintaining water supplies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Historically, responses to drought have been reactive.\nInternational emergency assistance is dispatched once the emergency happens in\na bid to save lives and livelihoods. It then disappears when the immediate\ncrisis dissipates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This reactive emergency assistance occurs despite the\nreality that drought in the Horn of Africa is&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.hydrol-earth-syst-sci.net\/18\/3635\/2014\/hess-18-3635-2014.html\">cyclical<\/a>&nbsp;and&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S0048969718324987\">increasing<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>One way to improve drought resilience is to improve the\nmanagement of groundwater. Groundwater exists beneath the earth\u2019s surface and\nis stored in aquifers. These are bodies of permeable rock, like gravel or sand.\nElectrical pumps can be used to retrieve this water, which is then stored and\ndistributed through pipes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>An estimated&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/cgspace.cgiar.org\/bitstream\/handle\/10568\/93112\/PB-N9-web.pdf?sequence=1&amp;isAllowed=y\">400\nmillion people in Africa<\/a>&nbsp;use groundwater. In the past decades,\nthroughout the Horn of Africa, millions of dollars&nbsp;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.iwmi.cgiar.org\/Publications\/Books\/PDF\/groundwater_availability_and_use_in_sub-saharan_africa_a_review_of_15_countries.pdf\">have\nbeen<\/a>&nbsp;spent on the installation of borehole pumps so people can access\ngroundwater.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>However,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.water-alternatives.org\/index.php\/volume6\/v6issue3\/220-a6-3-1\/file\">evidence shows<\/a>\u00a0that local communities and regional governments are not yet able to manage the operations, maintenance and service delivery of groundwater. This is because they\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pmc\/articles\/PMC3472012\/\">lack<\/a>\u00a0funding and professional capacities \u2013 such as maintenance training, asset management tools, supply chains, and financially viable service contracts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As a result, there have been a high number of water point failures. For example, in Kenya,\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/reliefweb.int\/report\/kenya\/unicef-kenya-humanitarian-situation-report-1-january-2017-31-december-2017\">about<\/a>\u00a035% of rural water supplies were broken before the 2016 drought. This increased to over 55% during the drought because of mechanical failures or depleted groundwater.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/theconversation.com\/groundwater-can-prevent-drought-emergencies-in-the-horn-of-africa-heres-how-124837\">Read\nmore\u2026<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Evan Thomas Millions of people living in the arid regions of the Horn of Africa&nbsp;lack&nbsp;safe, reliable and affordable water&nbsp;throughout&nbsp;the year. This is&nbsp;because of&nbsp;recent decreases in rainfall in the drought-prone&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6455,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":"","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[101],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6454","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-international-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6454","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6454"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6454\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6455"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6454"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6454"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rayscohosting.best\/ASM\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6454"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}