ABSTRACT
ABSTRACT: The application of quantitative approaches, such as DRASTIC, to assessing groundwater vulnerability at village scale in the weathered basement aquifer of sub-Saharan Africa is questionable. This is because the techniques are data intensive and were developed for regional scale evaluation. Deconstruction of the techniques allows the key influencing parameters to be identified. These parameters can be reviewed in terms of their likely influence on the weathered basement aquifer system and ranked as being of likely high, medium or low importance. Reassembly in the form of a scorecard, using only those parameters which can be judged subjectively in the field, produces a simple vulnerability assessment technique that can be applied at village and small town scale throughout the basement aquifer of sub-Saharan Africa. It is hoped that this tried and validated technique will provide a way forward for groundwater resource vulnerability assessment in the rural savannah lands underlain by the weathered basement aquifer system.
