Sahel/Water: a region under pressure
-- a note from _kt75 The Sahelian zone is subject to a significant drought. Missing rainfalls [ 1 ], local and regional conflicts as well as inefficient farming methods number among the key reasons [ 2 ]-[ 4 ]. Actually a fertile grassland located among the dessert in the North and the rain forest in the South, the Sahelian region is highly dependent upon sufficient rain fall [ 5 ], [ 1 ]. However, since the late 1960ies a notable decline in rainfall intensity has been recorded [ 1 ] and thus access to surface water is more and more limited [ 5 ]-[ 7 ]. As pivotal aspect for this development the global warming (climate change) has been detected. In order to tackle and overcome this critical situation in the past years a number of efforts, in particular of technical nature have been launched. One example is the successful installation of solar power operated ground water wells which are well-suited to facilitate decentralised water supply [ 8 ]. The use of ground water in ...