Applications of Geoinformatics in Water Resources Management of SemiArid Region, North Karnataka, India

Karnataka is lack of water resources, especially in its arid and semiarid regions. So the management of water resources in these areas is very important. The annual average rainfall of 50 cm for the whole country and its totality area, it has been discovered that total water resources in India are of the order of 167 million hectaremeters. It has further been calculated that only 66 million hectaremeters of water resources in India can be employed for irrigation. The population of India as on 2011 stood at 1,210,193,422 (1.21 billion) persons. Thus, India supports about 1/6^thof world population, 1/50^thof world's land and 1/25^thof world's water resources. India also has a livestock population of 500 million, which is about 20 percent of the world's total livestock population. More than half of these are cattle, forming the backbone of Indian agriculture. The total utilizable water resources of the country are assessed as 1086 km³. Geoinformatics technology has its special advantage in this aspect. The paper introduces the applications of Geoinformatics, including remote sensing, geographical information system and global positioning system, in this field, such as surface water resources, groundwater exploration, dynamic monitoring of floods, water environment and drought monitoring, planning of water diversion project between basins and so on. It shows that Geoinformatics technology can play important role for North Karnataka development, especially in India. India is still an agricultural country; the water consumed in agriculture is the most significant one.