Impact of the Syrian refugee crisis on land use and transboundary freshwater resources

Müller, Marc François; Yoon, Jim; Gorelick, Steven M.; Avisse, Nicolas; Tilmant, Amaury

doi:10.1073/pnas.1614342113

i

Impact of the Syrian refugee crisis on land use and transboundary freshwater resources

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2016
By Müller, Marc François ; Yoon, Jim ; Gorelick, Steven M. ; ...

Details

Journal Title:

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America
Personal Author:

Müller, Marc François ; Yoon, Jim ; Gorelick, Steven M. ; Avisse, Nicolas ; Tilmant, Amaury
NOAA Program & Office:

NESDIS (National Environmental Satellite, Data, and Information Service) ; NCEI (National Centers for Environmental Information)
Description:

Since 2013, hundreds of thousands of refugees have migrated southward to Jordan to escape the Syrian civil war that began in mid-2011. Evaluating impacts of conflict and migration on land use and transboundary water resources in an active war zone remains a challenge. However, spatial and statistical analyses of satellite imagery for the recent period of Syrian refugee mass migration provide evidence of rapid changes in land use, water use, and water management in the Yarmouk-Jordan river watershed shared by Syria, Jordan, and Israel. Conflict and consequent migration caused similar to 50% decreases in both irrigated agriculture in Syria and retention of winter rainfall in Syrian dams, which gave rise to unexpected additional stream flow to downstream Jordan during the refugee migration period. Comparing premigration and postmigration periods, Syrian abandonment of irrigated agriculture accounts for half of the stream flow increase, with the other half attributable to recovery from a severe drought. Despite this increase, the Yarmouk River flow into Jordan is still substantially below the volume that was expected by Jordan under the 1953, 1987, and 2001 bilateral agreements with Syria.
Keywords:

Climate-change Conflict Drought Fertile Crescent Irrigation Landsat Management Remote Sensing Reservoir Science Technology Fertile Crescent Remote Sensing
Source:

PNAS 113 (52) 14932-14937; https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1614342113
DOI:

https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1614342113
Pubmed ID:

27930317
Pubmed Central ID:

PMC5206523
Document Type:

Journal Article
Place as Subject:

Jordan River
Rights Information:

Other
Compliance:

PMC
Main Document Checksum:

urn:sha256:7b25e2a3cdf77466fb5c22e59fc94c7b8742394508fd84075f44a0eeb6ad4134
Download URL:

https://repository.library.noaa.gov/view/noaa/29232/noaa_29232_DS1.pdf
File Type:

[PDF - 1.11 MB ]

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