 |
Within a stone’s throw: Lebanon right, Syria left |
The pristine source waters of the Al-Kabir River, originating from underground springs and mountain tops, peacefully flow towards the Mediterranean Sea. Forming a natural border between northern Lebanon and southern Syria, the waters face a variety of threats during their short journey west. While the politicians of both countries are now busy working out their long-standing political tensions, their scientists are showing a high spirit of common Arab identity and unity. They have joined forces to use modern remote sensing technologies to find practical solutions for the transboundary water management of Al-Kabir’s waters.
Up in the mountains of northern Lebanon, Fadwa, a 40-year-old mother and housewife, remembers when the waters of Al-Kabir passing by her house were clear. Fadwa explained that she doesn’t allow her children to play in the river waters anymore.
“The Syrians started it by dumping raw sewage into the river about five years back,” she complained. “Now the river waters are so dirty that we gave up and started dumping our own garbage onto the sides of the river near our home,” she added.
A young Lebanese girl living at the mouth of the river gave a similar excuse. “[The Lebanese government] has done nothing,” she said, dumping her pail of garbage on the shores of the river near her home. This girl, like many others living in the poorly served Akkar region of northern Lebanon, believes that it is only the government who should be providing solutions for the region’s waste problems. This blame game attitude demonstrated by the people of the region is exactly what Dr. Mohamed Khawlie, director of Lebanon’s National Center for Remote Sensing, wants to change.
“Community solutions and small-scale, easily manageable plans for solid waste and wastewater management [are needed],” said Khawlie. “The contribution of the community should be significant,” he said. “If communities do not do what they should be doing, give them the best science and it will be useless. Communities must feel the ownership of what is affecting their living,” he emphasized.
Cooperative Research Involvement
|
| The Akkar watershed |
This strong belief in the importance of community involvement formed a centerpiece for the research conducted by scientists from the Lebanese National Council for Scientific Research (NCSR) and the General Organization of Remote Sensing (GORS) in Syria, together with researchers from Canada’s CadhamHayes Systems Inc. (now Canadian Environmental Assistance). The research aimed at gathering scientific data on the Al-Kabir River basin, known as the Akkar watershed. This data would be used to create higher levels of awareness among the people of both countries on the importance of conserving the watershed.
Two public awareness workshops were held, one in Lebanon and another in Syria. During these workshops, the scientists revealed disturbing results that were emerging from their remote sensing studies and sampling that was being conducted on the watershed. Although not suffering in quantity, the Al-Kabir waters were severely suffering in quality.
Daunting Results
|
| Who is responsible? |
The Al-Kabir River runs a westerly course originating at an elevation of approximately 1700 meters in the mountains of the border area eventually emptying its waters into the Mediterranean Sea. Along this course it travels through scenic terraced mountains in the east; through the fertile alluvial plain of Sahlet el Bqaiaa; a gorge in the basaltic plateau; and finally the coastal Akkar plain, an extensive agricultural region.
The researchers used remote sensing and geographical information system (GIS) to provide, for the first time, maps on the watershed’s drainage, geology, land use, soil erosion, utilities, settlements, roads, and railways. Water and sediment samples were also routinely taken from a large number of sites on both the Syrian and Lebanese sides of the Al-Kabir River.
In addition to discovering that the river was primarily fed by springs, a number of disturbing results were revealed. Phosphorus and ammonium nitrogen levels, for example, were found to be extremely high along the course of the river, indicating pollution of the river with sewage. Bacterial coliform levels were also extremely high from sewage waste. Also, the “flagrant disposal of solid domestic waste directly into the river, on riverbanks, and on roadsides throughout the watershed,” has resulted in high nitrite levels in the Al-Kabir, the study revealed.
Agriculture has also had its toll on the river waters. Nitrates, mainly from fertilizer use, were revealed in high levels. Extensive irrigation has resulted in an early onset of salinization in the coastal agricultural plain. DDT parent compound was also found in the river sediment at higher levels than its metabolite. This, the researchers say, indicates this banned substance’s continued use by local farmers as a pesticide.
In addition, high levels of nickel and chromium were discovered in the river sediment. This has probably resulted from leather tanning and metal plating activities that are active in the region. As a result of this large-scale pollution, the groundwater in the Akkar watershed is at stake of becoming polluted.
Hidden Dangers
|
| Local farmers are unaware of the risk they are taking |
In Al-Obodiya, in the coastal plain of the watershed, a van drives up to a spring that feeds the Al-Kabir. The water emanates from below a huge rock, toward which a group of five workers proceed, carrying crates of green onions. The green onions are lined up against the rock, and the workers start to clean them in the cool, spring waters.
“These people are unknowingly polluting both the spring and river waters,” commented Khawlie, watching them diligently doing their work. “Agrochemicals from the onions are getting into the spring and river water, and the already polluted river waters are contaminating the onions,” he explained.
If the current state of conditions is not soon changed, not only will the health and the agriculture of the local populations be affected, but so will the plans for constructing a dam on the Al-Kabir River. The waters that will be collecting in the reservoir behind the dam will have even higher concentrations of pollutants than the river waters, making the water unsuitable for human consumption and contact. It will also lose its aesthetic value as a possible tourist destination in the future due to the rancid, murky waters that will be collecting behind its wall.
Solutions
The researchers made a series of recommendations to policy-makers based on their results to solve the problems of the Akkar watershed. Three phases of implementation were recommended. The first phase calls for immediate clean-up of the solid and sewage waste, in addition to the elimination of the use of DDT and other banned agrochemicals. The intermediate phase involves the local communities; changing their attitudes toward waste disposal and agricultural use of pesticides and fertilizers, in addition to providing them with small-scale community sewage treatment plants. The final stage is developing a protocol for the bi-national sustainable management of the Akkar watershed.
Implementing Research
John Cadham, President of CadhamHayes Systems Inc. and the original driving force behind the Akkar watershed study, believes that research can play an important role in influencing decision-makers in their policy-making processes of transboundary water management. However, the challenge, he believes, is how to fund such efforts.
“In my experience,” explained Cadham, “the cost of post-research lobbying is equal
| “The cost of post-research lobbying is equal to if not greater than the costs of the original research.” John Cadham |
to if not greater than the costs of the original research…So, there is a real gap at this stage and consequently, one of the biggest detriments to effecting meaningful change.”
Cadham believes that researchers have a vital role to play in effecting meaningful policy changes, but regrets that they are rarely equipped for the task. “Translating research into policy recommendations is a complex and sensitive task that requires specialized skills, understanding, and adequate funding,” he said. “This is particularly true in bi- or multi-national settings where the issues so often transcend the basic parameters of research. I believe that, in the Akkar project, the research team had the skills and expertise to do this, but we lacked adequate funding to carry the work forward.”
Another important point that Cadham raises is whether it would be proper for a
funding agency to support the necessary lobbying efforts following the publishing of research results. These efforts could easily be misrepresented by opposing interests as political interference, Cadham fears. On the other hand, “local researchers are too often seen or portrayed [by their governments] as self-interested and looking to benefit only their own agencies or organizations. The international partners, rightly or wrongly, are seen as more impartial and are often more easily accorded a hearing,” said Cadham.
Regardless, researchers have paved the way for policy-makers both in the Dead Sea basin and the Akkar watershed. “We’ve done what researchers can do,” concluded Dr. Mohamad Khawlie in Lebanon, driving into the sunset leaving Akkar toward his home city of Beirut. “Now we need implementation.”
|
