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Rivers and their surrounding lands are focal points of human development in the landscape. However, activities associated with development can greatly affect river processes, causing significant and often unintended environmental and human impacts. Despite the profound and varied environmental impacts that development-related alterations cause through hydrological, geomorphic, and ecological processes, they are not widely acknowledged outside of river management and affect resource availability and hazard exposure to people. In this paper, we propose a novel, interdisciplinary conceptual framework of river–land process interactions to support sustainable management and development. We introduce the term ‘land–river interface’ (LRI) to describe areas of the landscape in which river processes affect land, vegetation, and/or fauna, including humans, directly or indirectly. The multiple links between LRI processes and factors at the river basin, valley, and river channel (i.e. reach) scale are synthesized and a conceptual zonation of the LRI based on the process is proposed to serve as a framework to understand the impacts of human activity. Three examples of development-related activities (urbanization, dams and aggregate mining) illustrate how alteration to the form and functioning of river basins, valleys, and channels cause a range of impacts to be propagated throughout the landscape, often spatially or temporally distant from the activity. The diversity and severity of these impacts on the environment and people underscore the need to incorporate river processes, as represented in the LRI concept, into broader environmental management to better anticipate and mitigate negative impacts and maximize positive outcomes to deliver the benefits of sustainable development across society.

The coastal aquifer of the Essaouira syncline (Morocco) was studied to identify the main processes at the origin of the salinization of groundwater. In fact, a multicriteria analysis approach on hydrochemical data and physicochemical parameters of the Plio-Pleistocene aquifer was used to understand their spatio-temporal variation and their origins. Currently, integrated water resource management has become paramount to both local, regional, national, and international. This management is favored by extreme hydrological events (droughts or floods) which can have direct influences on human, economic, and political aspects. Appropriate management of a resource requires its evaluation. The statistical study by Kohonen's self-organized classification (SOM) of hydrochemical data for the years 1995 and 2009 is used to process 47 samples distributed over the Haha region; it showed an evolution of the values of the parameters. Physico-chemical is a function of time and space with an increase in the values of the parameters, from the center of the study area towards the southwest.

Context Contemporary resource management paradigms within the developed world build on an understanding of human agency as ontologically distinct from the mode of existence of plants and animals. Because of this perspective, which gives priority to human agency, policies typically take their point of departure with human societies and associated ecosystems deemed of particular value. Objectives As an alternative to this worldview, social theorists have introduced what is known as “flat ontology”, where all beings are bestowed equal rights to negotiate their existence. To explore the implications of introducing such an understanding into landscape management, a participatory planning process for water allocation was developed and tested in a case study in the Eerste River Catchment in South Africa. Methods The planning process was mediated using the approach “politics of nature” (PoN), which aims to operationalize flat ontology to renegotiate water allocation based on the needs of all beings instead of the desire of a subset of humans. PoN allowed participants to playfully co-develop a common ontology and value-set. Data documenting these processes were collected digitally and analysed. Results Results indicate that the approach engendered a rethinking of key relationships between human agency and ecosystem functionality, illustrating a potential for PoN-approaches to be deployed for governance of complex landscapes. Conclusions On the basis of experiments using PoN-methodology in the context of watershed management, it is discussed how the introduction of a flat ontology in landscape research, could inspire new ways of designing and intervening with collaborative resource management processes. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10980-021-01374-9.

The project investigated the state of wastewater treatment administrative management in some of the more remote locations of South Africa, in term of the ability to realise wastewater as a potential and a viable water resource in a semi-arid land. The primary objectives centred on the element responsible for the delivery challenges within the wastewater treatment spaces, towards integrated water resource management efforts. Findings suggested that some of the more pertinent challenges emanated from shortfalls in the implementation of legislative policies, and the lack of sufficient drivers within the water resource environment. Results from most of the locations of interest showed various limitations, including the lack of adequate water treatment infrastructure, insufficient operation and maintenance schedules, limited technical skills and training, and poor management capacities. The analytical approach applied in this study was that of a wastewater management capacity framework. A workable capacity framework is proposed and discussed. The capacity framework takes into account the intricate and unique environment within a South African context, both socioeconomically and in the natural setting.

Scientists and practitioners agree that integrated water resource management is necessary, with an increasing need for research at the regional scale (10 3 to 10 5 km 2 ). At this scale interactions between environmental and human systems are fully developed and global change is linked to local actions. The groundwater-surface water interaction (GW-SW) is of particular interest. Herein we review the scientific journal literature and examine GW-SW at the regional scale. We briefly review all existing literature on GW-SW, then summarise its characteristics at different scales and identify specific challenges of the regional scale. We explore whether GW-SW should be treated differently at regional and local scales. Regional GW-SW is rarely examined in experimental field studies, which almost exclusively cover small areas. However, GW-SW is often integral to large scale coupled models. Thus, we collate information about existing models and their regional applications. Fully coupled, physics-based models have great potential to meet the technical challenges. However, limited data availability hampers the application of complex models at the regional scale and loosely coupled schemes are more widely applied. Many integrated modelling concepts have been published, but none have been applied in a wide range of settings. Thus, it is impossible to compare the performance of different approaches. Comparative analyses of existing regional scale integrated models in the context of different data availability and geographic conditions are needed. Unfortunately, peer-reviewed journal literature no longer provides a representative picture of the subject as models are becoming Btoo big to be published^ or too pragmatic.

In the past decade, water security has emerged as a new discourse in water governance challenging the more traditional dominant discourse of integrated water resources management (IWRM). This review article applies the ‘ways of knowing’ approach to study the relationship between these two discourses. In doing so, we uncover how IWRM has been narrowly construed as a prescriptive way of knowing water based largely on technical–scientific knowledge, while water security represents a discursive way of knowing water with a greater consideration of human values, ethics and power. We argue that these two ways of knowing are complementary rather than conflicting. As both discourses are pursued at multiple levels, the practical way of knowing will emerge to represent how these concepts interact in a specific policy context.

The important relationship between health and water necessitates consideration of water vulnerability. Water vulnerability is contingent upon biophysical and social drivers operating at multiple scales, and is difficult to assess. This paper offers a systematic review of 50 water vulnerability assessment tools. We identify and synthesise the contents of these assessment tools (710 indicators) into five dimensions and 22 sub-dimensions and consider the extent to which they reflect environmental and social aspects. The findings are discussed in light of a holistic approach to water resources management, and specifically Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM). Significant opportunities exist to enhance the efficacy of water vulnerability assessment tools by incorporating indicators and operational measures for social considerations (e.g., adaptation, institutions, governance) that are developed outside the context of water. AuthorCount:3