India's water sector gets help from geospatial tech

India's water use efficiency can be enhanced through intelligent use of geospatial technology.

India's water sector gets help from geospatial tech

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• The story: The Association of Geospatial Industries released a report titled "Potential of Geospatial Technologies for the Water Sector in India". It highlights the role that geospatial technologies can play in water sector here.
• Water crisis: As the severity of the water crisis in India increases every year, central and state government agencies are using a variety of resources to tackle the water crisis. One among them is the adoption of Geospatial technologies.
• Points to note:

1. Overview - India has about 17% of the world population, but only about 4% of the world’s freshwater reserves, and is currently facing a severe water challenge. This demand-supply mismatch is quite striking.
2. Water reservoirs - The total capacity of India’s reservoirs stands at 250 billion cubic meters (bcm), while its total water bearing capacity over the surface is around 320 bcm.
3. Not collecting enough - India receives 3,000 billion cubic metres of water every year through rainfall or other sources such as glaciers; of this, only 8% is collected.
4. Groundwater reliance - India fills groundwater aquifers at the rate of 458 bcm per year, while it extracts around 650 bcm of water from the earth. 89% of India’s water resources are used for agriculture, out of which 65% is withdrawn from under the ground. One of India’s biggest challenges is to conserve groundwater.
5. Water stress - As per a NITI Aayog report, currently nearly 820 million people in 12 major river basins of India face extreme water stress.
6. Quality of water - Adding to the issue of lack of water availability is the issue of water quality. Groundwater in one-third of India’s 600 districts is contaminated mainly through fluoride and arsenic. There has been a 136% increase in the number of grossly polluting industries between 2011- 2018, according to the State of India’s Environment report, 2019.

• Conserving water: Given the population density and requirement of water for agriculture, India is heavily dependent on groundwater and is one of the worst hit countries as far as the water crisis is concerned. Availability of clean water to all for personal, industrial, and agricultural use will not only ensure India reaches its vision of becoming a USD 5 Trillion economy but will also enable it to achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
• Geospatial technologies: This term is used to describe the range of modern tools contributing to the geographic mapping and analysis of the Earth and human societies. The term 'geospatial' refers not to one single technology, but a collection of technologies that help to collect, analyse, store, manage, distribute, integrate, and present geographic information. It consists of the following technologies: Remote Sensing, GIS (Geographic Information System), GNSS (Global Navigation Satellite System), Survey, and 3D modelling.

1. Benefits - Geospatial technology enables better measurement, management, and maintenance of assets, monitoring of resources and even providing predictive and prescriptive analysis for forecasting and planned interventions.
2. For water sector - Geospatial and digital technologies like Satellite Based Remote Sensing, GPS Based Equipment and Sensors, Artificial Intelligence, Big Data Analytics, Internet of Things, 5G, Robotics and Digital Twin, can be effectively used to combat the water crisis.
3. Efficiency - The Agriculture sector is the largest user of water resources, and uses 80-85% of water resources, while have only about 30-35% efficiency of water use. Geospatial technologies can be used for increasing water use efficiency, so that this can be increased to at least 50%.

• Major ongoing water projects:  Recognising the water crisis in India, the government of India formed a single ministry i.e Ministry of Jal Shakti. Previously, water was a subject which was dealt with by almost nine Ministries.

        Jal Jeevan Mission
        Dam Rehabilitation and Improvement Project (DRIP)
        Namami Gange
        National River Linking Project (NRLP)
        Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT)
        National Hydrology Programme
        Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayi Yojana (PMKSY)
        National Aquifer Mapping and Management Programme (NAQUIM)
        River Basin Management
        Atal Bhujal Yojana (ABHY)
        National Water Mission

• Suggestions for the future:

1. Long-term vision - To derive maximum benefit from geospatial technology implementation in various programmes, user departments need to build a long-term vision of the outcomes of geospatial implementation.
2. Integrated platform - An integrated collaborative platform to connect the data and technology used by various organizations need to be developed for seamless access to information both locally and nationally and enable decision making.
3. Data and system integration - Various datasets including demography, socio-cultural, economic, and other parameters need to be integrated with spatial and non-spatial data related to water, like soil moisture, annual rainfall, rivers, aquifer, groundwater levels, water quality etc.

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