Linking databases of different sources and scales for groundwater research in the Urema River Basin/Central Mozambique

Abstract

The Urema River basin is the major sub catchment of the Pungue River basin situated in Central Mozambique. The Urema River basin controls the ecosystem of the Lake Urema, which with its extended flood plains forms a major feature of the Gorongosa National Park. The Urema River influences the flood and low water levels of the Pungue River, which is the main source of potable water of Beira — the second largest city of Mozambique. The area of the Urema river basin is densely populated and intensively used for subsistence agriculture, timber production, widely spread gold mining, tourism and nature conservation.

A university project aiming at developing a model of the groundwater dynamics and assessing groundwater qualities of the Urema River basin was recently initiated. Up to now very few groundwater investigations were conducted in Mozambique. Current database management of groundwater data is poorly developed. Data are kept in tabular formats and serve mainly for record keeping purposes. Confronted with these challenges the presentation demonstrates the project’s approaches of linking the various database sources to achieve a large to medium scale concept of the hydrodynamics of the Urema River basin.

Based on current project findings the improvement of the resolution of digital data from current small to larger scales is necessary to enhance information contents. Further geochronological investigations are required to understand the geological evolution of the area and to update the stratigraphic order of geological formations. In future a groundwater-monitoring network needs to be established to capture long-term and baseline data.