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Sharing Groundwater Information, Knowledge and Experience on a Worldwide Scale
JAC A.M. VAN DER GUN
International Groundwater Resources Assessment Centre (IGRAC), PO Box 80015, 3508 TA Utrecht, The Netherlands
Importance of Sharing Groundwater-Related Information, Knowledge and Experience on a Worldwide Scale
Rationale behind sharing information Sharing information is at least as old as mankind, maybe even as old as primitive life on earth. Parents bring up their children by teaching them all they consider necessary or useful for their proper development into independent and happy human beings. When children grow up, the initially predominantly unidirectional flow of information gradually changes into a balanced bidirectional process. However, sharing information is not restricted to the parent–child relationship, but can be observed between all people who have something in common: partners in marriage, relatives, friends, neighbours, members of the same community or a nation, colleagues, business partners, etc. Why do we share knowledge and experience By instinct, we know that knowledge and experience are important for survival and for feeding into the learning processes that help making us more successful in daily life. Sharing knowledge and experience has the potential to accelerate these learning processes significantly. Sharing information simply improves efficiency, stimulates development and reduces the probability of making wrong decisions. It is evident that good relations between people stimulate their preparedness for sharing information.
Importance of a knowledge base related to groundwater It is commonly agreed that major water issues of our time include meeting basic human needs for water, securing food supply, protecting ecosystems and avoid362 CAB International 2007. The Agricultural Groundwater Revolution: Opportunities and Threats to Development (M. Giordano and K.G. Villholth)
Sharing Groundwater Information, Knowledge and Experience

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