THE WESTERN WATER COMMISSION: WATERSHED MANAGEMENT RECEIVES THE AVI'ENTION OF A NEW GENERATION1

ABSTRACT: Our nation periodically reviews national water policy and considers its directions for the future. The most recent examination was directed at the western United States and the role of the federal agencies in meeting its needs. The West is no longer the frontier, but rather contains vibrant cities and booming centers of international trade, as well as tourism, mineral, and oil and gas development, agricultural, and other development. In this changing environment, federal water policies need to consider the long term sustainability of the West, provide justice to Indian tribes, protect the rivers and ecosystems on which natural systems depend, balance the needs of newcomers with those of agricultural users and communities, and meet a myriad of other demands. The Western Water Policy Review Advisory Commission has just concluded its review of these issues and issued its report. Key among the recommendations is the need to coordinate federal agencies at the basin and watershed level and make government more responsive to local needs, but within a framework that includes national mandates. The Commission's recommendations are presented here, along with some of the issues that surrounded the operations of the Commission.     

LANDCARE AND COMMUNITY-LED WATERSHED MANAGEMENT IN VICTORIA,AUSTRALIA1

ABSTRACT: Australia's ‘Landcare’ program is a community-based participatory program established by government to tackle the problem of land degradation. Landcare involves thousands of Australians working together in locally based groups, tackling problems of common concern. Government and community are now looking to ‘scale up’ the Landcare idea to a regional level. State and territory governments have moved to create regional (often watershed-based) frameworks for land management planning and resource conservation, in accordance with the concept of integrated watershed management. Growing out of the success of community involvement in Landcare, many of these approaches involve the community. However scaling up of the Landcare idea introduces problems of both time and space. There have been a number of problems experienced in the implementation of Landcare and integrated watershed management. These problems include the equitable delineation of membership on decision-making bodies; the raising of sufficient funds for program implementation; and the coordination of a diversity of governmental layers, planning processes and management programs. This paper reviews how the State of Victoria has responded to these challenges and suggests what challenges remain.     

WATERSHED AND LAKE WATER QUALITY ASSESSMENT: AN INTEGRATED MODELING APPROACH1

Watershed planning groups and action agencies seek to understand how lake water quality responds to changes in watershed management. This study developed and demonstrated the applicability of an integrated modeling approach for providing this information. An integrated model linking watershed conditions to water-quality of the receiving lake incorporated the following components: (1) an event-based AGNPS model to estimate watershed pollutant losses; (2) annualization of AGNPS results to produce annual lake pollutant loadings; (3) a base flow separation package, SAM, to estimate base flow; (4) estimates of nutrients in base flow and point sources; and (5) linkage of watershed loadings directly to EUTROMOD lake water quality algorithms. Results are presented for Melvern Lake, a 28-km² multipurpose reservoir with a 900-km² agricultural watershed in east central Kansas. Reasonable estimates of current lake quality were attained using an average phosphorus availability factor of 31 percent to calibrate model results to measured in-lake phosphorus. Comparison of a range of possible scenarios, including all cropland changed to no-till (best case) and all CRP and good-condition grasslands changed to cropland (worst case), indicated only a (4 percent change for in-lake phosphorus and a (2 percent change for chlorophyll a. These results indicated that this watershed is not sensitive to projected changes in land use and management.     

POTENTIAL CLIMATE CHANGE IMPACTS ON WATER RESOURCES IN THE GREAT PLAINS1

ABSTRACT: This paper reports on the current assessment of climate impacts on water resources, including aquatic ecosystems, agricultural demands, and water management, in the U.S. Great Plains. Climate change in the region may have profound effects on agricultural users, aquatic ecosystems, and urban and industrial users alike. In the central Great Plains Region, the potential impacts of climate changes include changes in winter snowfall and snow-melt, growing season rainfall amounts and intensities, minimum winter temperature, and summer time average temperature. Specifically, results from general circulation models indicate that both annual average temperatures and total annual precipitation will increase over the region. However, the seasonal patterns are not uniform. The combined effect of these changes in weather patterns and average seasonal climate will affect numerous sectors critical to the economic, social and ecological welfare of this region. Research is needed to better address the current competition among the water needs of agriculture, urban and industrial uses, and natural ecosystems, and then to look at potential changes. These diverse demands on water needs in this region compound the difficulty in managing water use and projecting the impact of climate changes among the various critical sectors in this region.     

DEFINING WATERSHED-SCALE EVAPORATION USING A NORMALIZED DIFFERENCE VEGETATION INDEX1

Monthly composites of the Normalized Difference Vegetation Indices (NDVI), derived from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer (AVILRR), were transformed linearly into monthly evaporation rates and compared with detailed hydrologic-model simulation results for five watersheds across the United States. Model-simulated monthly evaporation values showed high correlations (mean R²= .77) with NDVI-derived evaporation estimates. These latter estimates, used in a classical water balance model, resulted in equally accurate simulations of monthly runoff than when the model was run to estimate monthly evaporation via soil moisture accounting. Comparison of NDVI-derived evaporation estimates with pan data showed promise for transforming NDVI values into evaporation estimates under both wet and water-limiting conditions without resorting to the application of any kind of calibrated hydrologic models.     

基于人工影响天气的气象灾害减灾技术

对全国人工影响天气的气象灾害减灾技术及人工增雨防雹成果进行了归纳总结。提出根据不同气象灾害的特点，采取有针对性的减灾技术措施，并对减灾效益进行评估。通过对近年来我国基于人工影响天气技术的人工增雨防雹等作业范围及其规模、主要作业技术及其与国外的差距、作业区的减灾效益等进行分析，指出我国人工影响天气减灾技术及应用体系有了很大发展，并为减轻气象灾害提供了科学依据。     

Evolution and Application of Urban Watershed Management Planning

The development of Watershed Management Plans (WMPs) in urban areas aids municipalities in allocating resources, engaging the public and stakeholders, addressing water quality regulations, and mitigating issues related to stormwater runoff and flooding. In this study, 124 urban WMPs across the United States were reviewed to characterize historic approaches and identify emerging trends in watershed planning. Planning methods and tools were qualitatively evaluated, followed by statistical analyses of a subset of 63 WMPs to identify relationships between planning factors. Plans developed by a municipality or consultant were associated with more occurrences of hydrologic modeling and site‐specific recommendations, and fewer occurrences of characterizing social watershed factors, than plans authored by agencies, organizations, or universities. WMPs in the past decade exhibited greater frequency in the use of pollutant load models and spatially explicit hydrologic and hydraulic models. Project prioritization was found to increasingly focus on feasibility to implement proposed strategies. More recent plans additionally exhibited greater consideration for water quality, ecological health, and public participation. Innovation in planning methods and consideration of future watershed conditions are primary areas that were found to be deficient in the study WMPs, although analysis methods and tools continue to improve in the wake of advancing technology and data availability.     

农业非点源控制的美国经验借鉴

我国的农业非点源污染治理正处于攻坚期,但部分政策一定程度上缺少具体执行标准和规范,难以执行到位,法律法规碎片化、分散且难以评估执行效果。本文从美国治理非点源的国际经验出发,梳理了联邦层面的法律法规、农业环境管理机构的运作形式以及州层面流域管理规划和非点源控制计划。最后,根据国际经验提出了如下建议:一是建议要求各省在农业规划中加入推进农业流域治理清单;二是建议制定流域地表水质达标规划,实现点源与非点源联合管理;三是建议形成最佳管理实践规范技术指南,并对执行者进行相应补贴,形成监管机制;四是建议建立农业绿色补贴制度,鼓励地方形成可持续的农业发展机制。     

Effect of agricultural extension on cotton farmer's efficiency in arid and semi-arid areas of Burkina Faso

This study shows that farmers in arid and semi-arid land can improve their efficiency if they have access to agricultural extension services. An exhaustive survey was used to obtain data from 423 cotton producers in the arid zones and 144 of wetlands in Burkina Faso. The method of the directional distance function modeling a multi-output technology was used. The results show that cotton farmers in the arid zones are not technically more inefficient than those in wetlands. On average, arid zone producers have a technical inefficiency of 0.056 while that of wetland producers is around 0.052. The agricultural extension, defined as receiving visits and advice from technical agents, is important for producers because it helps farmers choose soil and water conservation techniques and fertilizers adapted to the Agro-climatic conditions of their respective zones. Agriculture extension also helps farmers of the arid zones to reduce their technical inefficiency by advising them to cultivate small agricultural plots. On average, in these zones, the size of an agricultural plot is around 1.03 ha compared to those of wetlands which is about 1.6 ha.     

协同引擎、外部环境与流域生态补偿多主体协同行为研究——以山东省大汶河流域为例

联合多方利益相关主体实施协同行为,提升多元异质性主体之间的协同性,对优化流域生态补偿机制效能至关重要。本文基于山东省大汶河流域的979份实地调研数据,运用层次回归与有调节的中介效应检验方法,实证剖析协同引擎、外部环境对流域生态补偿多主体协同行为的驱动机理。研究表明：①协同引擎对流域生态补偿多主体协同行为具有显著正向驱动作用;②协同意愿在协同引擎与协同行为之间起中介作用,协同引擎可通过强化协同意愿间接驱动协同行为;③外部环境正向调节协同意愿向协同行为的转化,政府规制与社会规范的调节作用均通过显著性检验;④有调节的中介效应检验结果显示,高水平的政府规制及社会规范影响下,协同意愿在协同引擎与协同行为之间的中介作用得到增强,但在低水平的政府规制与社会规范影响下,协同意愿的中介作用并不显著。