ABSTRACT
Papers presented at the Third Joint UAE-JAPAN Symposium on Sustainable GCC Environment and Water Resources, EWR2006, January 28-29, 2006, Abu Dhabi, UAE, was divided into two themes.
Theme A related to the environmental issues and published in “Reclaiming the Desert: Towards a Sustainable Environment in Arid Lands” In Developments in Arid Regions Research, DARE, Vol. 3, A.M.O. Mohamed (ed.), Taylor & Francis/Balkema, 2006
Theme B related to arid land hydrogeological issues and published in “Arid Land Hydrogeology: In Search of a Solution to a Threatened Resource” In Developments in Arid Regions Research, DARE, Vol. 4, A.M.O. Mohamed (ed.), Taylor & Francis/Balkema, 2006
After intensive discussions conducted by the participants of EWR 2006, the most important areas that have been selected for recommendations are:
1. Soil management; a. Sulfur utilization in agriculture b. Solar distillation c. Soil moisture enhancement d. Use of oily treated water in agriculture e. Soil solarization for direct thermal inactivation of soil borne-pests f. Utilization of adopted indigenous forage species to combat drought during vegetative and
reproductive stages in the field 2. Water management challenges; 3. Groundwater recharge in arid lands; 4. Groundwater contamination and management; 5. Monitoring systems; 6. Bioreactor Landfills; 7. Treatment of contaminated soils; 8. Waste water treatment; 9. Environmental impact assessment;
10. Risk management of polluted sites; and 11. Sulfur utilization in construction industry 12. Sustainable cities 13. Global warming 14. Oil spill management
1.1 Soil management
The constraints on managing soils for sustainable land use in dry lands are different in nature. Some are connected with the specificity of the natural conditions including soils, others with the prevailing socioeconomic conditions. Appropriate management of soils is the prerequisite of sustainable land use in the dry lands. Certain problems still require extensive research, e.g., soil resilience,
particularly in view of the diversity of dry land soils in different ecological conditions. Another area of research in the dry lands is the relationship between the processes of soil degradation and the resultant different ecological situations; to answer the question whether soil erosion is always harmful or whether it may be beneficial in certain cases depending on the nature of the soil parent material and soil formation. The above problems concerning the soils of dry lands are recommended as priorities for fundamental and adaptive research by the appropriate scientific institutions.
