This thesis is an examination of the United Arab Emirates claim to maritime zones and its practice in determining the boundaries of these zones. Such a comprehensive examination scarcely requires justification or introduction. The political and economic importance of determining the boundary of any state is self-evident. The matter of an undetermined boundary in the resource rich Gulf in particular was, and still is, a major threat to stability in the region. This study focuses on the problem of unsettled maritime boundaries with particular reference to the effect of certain disputed islands on the UAE-Iran boundary in the Arabian Gulf. The study assumes that the less the impact these Islands are afforded, the greater the opportunity of reaching a solution to the related sovereignty dispute between the two parties. Certain methods of dispute settlement are suggested where the restricted effect of these Islands could most readily be obtained. Finally, this work has the benefit of examining the UAE Federal Law of 1993 in respect of delimitation of its maritime boundaries; the Dubai/Sharjah Border Award of 1981, which was published in 1993; and the UAE-Saudi Arabia secret boundary agreement of 197 4, released in 1994. The thesis is divided into seven chapters. The first will examine the issue of maritime zones in international law, as well as the UAE practice in this field. The second and third chapters will address the issue of maritime boundary delimitation in international law. Chapter Four will focus on the UAE practice in determining its maritime boundaries both internal and external. It will also identify the UAE' s potential boundary with neighbouring states. Chapters Five, Six and Seven will be devoted to addressing the overall problem of the Iranian-UAE's un-delimited maritime boundaries. Chapter Five will examine the policy of the two states on offshore boundaries. It will also discuss the boundaries between Iran and the UAE in the Gulf of Oman and in the Abu-Dhabi sector. Chapter Six will discuss in some detail the issue of the three disputed islands, namely, Abu Musa, Greater and Little Tunbs islands, and their effect on the boundary of Iran and the UAE. It will also examine the effect of islands on maritime boundaries in general. The final chapter will address certain methods of disputes settlement that the parties have not yet utilised, which have the potential to facilitate an amicable solution.

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In 1982 the USA and other major industrial states refused to sign the Convention on the Law of the Sea--the result of the Conference on the Law of the Sea--because of objections to its provisions on the seabed beyond state jurisdiction--the International Seabed Area. According to them the system set up by the Convention is favorable to the third world and inimical to the material and ideological interests of these industrial states. Concurrently, however, the US and its allies argue that the remaining provisions of the Convention are generally accepted and part of International Law. These provisions include, among other, transit passage through straits, the 12nm Territorial Sea, the 200nm Exclusive Economic Zone and the Continental Shelf. In opposition to the Convention's seabed system the US has promoted efforts at a Reciprocating States' Agreement which, thus far, has resulted in a Provisional Understanding among eight western states. In this work I argue that the limits of state jurisdiction are not conclusively set and that both the Exclusive Economic Zone and the Continental Shelf are subject to political and legal challenges. Moreover, these challenges will grow stronger because of competition, primarily among the major industrial states, over the resources and the military and waste disposal uses of the seabed and because of the inconsistencies of major maritime states in their defense of narrow zones of coastal jurisdiction. With respect to the argument of the US and some of its allies that the deep seabed provisions of the Convention are beneficial to the third world and inimical to the major industrial states I suggest that this is not the case. In fact, the major industrial states are the primary beneficiaries of the Convention's seabed resource system, as they are the beneficiaries of the systems regulating the military and waste disposal uses of the High Seas and the international seabed. The core characteristic of the resource system, however, is the protection it offers to the less endowed among these industrial states and to the major industrializing states. Inasmuch as the Provisional Understanding does not protect these states--most of which are in a position to challenge a variety of the Convention's remaining provisions--the Reciprocating States' Agreement strategy is conflictual and destabilizing.

A field and pot culture study was undertaken in an attempt to determine the effect of saline solabeya water on soil salination, gatch formation and plant uptake of nutrients. Three gatch and three sandy soil profile samples were used in this studyo The soil samples were virgin profile 'A' samples from the Experim.ental Farm Extension, cultivated profile 'B' samples from. the Experim.ental Farm and cultivated profile '0' samples from Bid'a Nursery of the Education Department. The gatch samples were collected from sites 'A', '0' and plot No.6, of the Experimental Farm. Extension, Bidta Nursery and Experimental Farm respectively. Three indicator plants Lettuce (Lactuca sativa, variety Great Lakes), green beans (Phaseolus vulgariS, variety Black Valentine), and Petunia (Petunia hybrida) were used. The effect of soil texture, change in the reaction of the medium, concentration of solabeya saline water and soil solution on gatch formation were studied. A coarse sandy subsoil horizon high in silica constituted the proper medium for gatch formation. The major cementing agents were silica and the carbonates and hydroxides of calcium and magnesium. Alumina, iron oxide and gypsum. playa minor role in cementation due to their low concentration. An increase in the alkaline reaction and concentration of the saline solution favored precipitation of potential cementing agents present as soluble constituents of the medium. The presence of gatch and use of solabeya saline water lead to the formation of saline perched water table and soil salination. Different irrigation waters, representing various dilutions of solabeya saline water were used for irrigation of pot cultures. Different increments of nutrient solutions, supplying nitrogen, phosphorus, P9tassium, calcium, magnesium, and sodium were applied to the respective treatments of the pot cultures. The development, sequence of appearance, and severity of visual symptoms of general salinity effect showed direct corrolation with salt sensitivity of the indicator plant and the degree of salinity of the medium. In all cases, the symptoms were earlier and more severe in bean, followed by lettuce and petunia. As a result of cationic and anionic antagonism and an increase in the salinity of the medium, plant uptake of N, P, Ca, K, Fe and Mn was reduced, as revealed by the level of these elements in the leaves of the indicator plants, whereas the levels of Mg, Na, B, Cl, and SO₄ increased in the leaves of the indicator plants. The application of different increments of N, P, Ca, and K to the respective treatments of the indicator plant cultures resulted in a relative increase in the level of these elements in the leaves and a specific decrease in the level of the antagonistic elements. But, due to the effect of the increase in salinity of the medium of the respective treatments, and decrease in yield of green weight, the level of these elements maintained a gradual specific decrease in. the leaves.

The State of Arizona adopted strict groundwater conservation policies under the Arizona Groundwater Act of 1980. The Act mandates direct controls on groundwater use and provides incentives to seek alternative water supplies to offset the groundwater overdraft and restrict the expansion of municipal well fields. The City of Tucson, to reduce its groundwater dependency, is contracting for Central Arizona Project (CAP) water. CAP water comes from the Colorado River and carries with it nearly a ton of salts per acre-foot. Conservation programs being investigated by the city include reclaimed wastewater reuse for municipal use and artificial recharge. Salinity, a conservative contaminant, will rise as the water carrying it evaporates away during use. Some saline incidental recharge from wastewater irrigated acreage in the municipal well field is picked-up by groundwater pumpage in what is described as the municipal water-salinity cycle. The rate of salinity pick-up is compounded in the cycle. Those responsible for achieving groundwater conservation under the mandates of the Act do not include the costs generated by salinity damages and suffered by municipal water-consumers into their conservation plans. Salinity damages costs are generated by the direct use of CAP water and the use of degraded groundwater supplies. The study results show that under assumptions of limited groundwater dilution volumes the annual rate of salinity pick-up can range from about 1.4 percent to nearly 2.0 percent. An annual average pick-up rate of 2.0 percent could degrade Tucson's groundwater supplies from the present average salinity of 300 mg/1 to 1000 mg/1 in 61 years. Thirteen scenarios were evaluated and the present value of incremental costs of both salinity damage and expenditures associated with conservation were calculated. While estimates of salinity damage costs are many times lower than the conservation program expenditures, increased salinity in groundwater will lower the future capital value of the resource in the future if ignored.

Peatlands cover approximately 2-3% of the world’s land area yet represent approximately a third of the worlds estimated total soil carbon pool. They therefore play an important role in regulating global atmospheric CO2 and CH4 concentrations, and even minor changes in their ability to store carbon could potentially have significant effects on global climate change. Much previous research has focussed primarily on land-atmosphere fluxes. Where aquatic fluxes have been considered, they are often in isolation from the rest of the catchment and usually focus on downstream losses, ignoring evasion (degassing) from the water surface. However, as peatland streams have been repeatedly shown to be highly supersaturated in both CO2 and CH4 with respect to the atmosphere, they potentially represent an important pathway for catchment GHG losses. This study aimed to a) create a complete GHG and carbon budget for Auchencorth Moss catchment, Scotland, linking both terrestrial and aquatic fluxes, and b) understand what controls and drives individual fluxes within this budget. This understanding was further developed by a short study of C exchange at the peat-aquatic interface at Mer Bleue peatland, Canada. Significant variability in soil-atmosphere fluxes of both CH4 and N2O emissions was evident at Auchencorth Moss; coefficients of variation across 21 field chambers were 300% and 410% for CH4 and N2O, respectively. Both in situ chamber measurements and a separate mesocosm study illustrated the importance of vegetation in controlling CH4 emissions. In contrast to many previous studies, CH4 emissions were lower and uptake greater where aerenchymous vegetation was present. Water table depth was also an important driver of variability in CH4 emissions, although the effect was only evident during either periods of extreme drawdown or when the water table was consistently near or above the peat surface. Significant pulses in both CH4 and N2O emissions were observed in response to fluctuations in water table depth. Despite the variability in CH4 and N2O emissions and the uncertainty in up-scaled estimates, their contribution to the total GHG and carbon budgets was minor. Concentrations of dissolved CO2 in peatland drainage waters ranged from a mean of 2.88 ± 0.09 mg C L-1 in the Black Burn, Scotland, to a mean of 7.64 ± 0.80 mg C L-1 in water draining Mer Bleue, Canada. Using non-dispersive infra-red (NDIR) CO2 sensors with a 10-minute measurement frequency, significant temporal variability was observed in aquatic CO2 concentrations at the 2 contrasting field sites. However, the drivers of this variability differed significantly. At Mer Bleue, Canada, biological activity in the water column led to clear diurnal cycles, whereas in the Black Burn draining Auchencorth Moss, dilution due to discharge was the primary driver. The NDIR sensor data also showed differences in soil-stream connectivity both between the sites (connectivity was weak at Mer Bleue) and across the range of conditions measured at Auchencorth Moss i.e. connectivity increased during periods of stormflow. Compiling the results from both the terrestrial and aquatic systems at Auchencorth Moss indicated that the catchment was functioning as a net sink for GHGs (382 kg CO2-eq ha-1 yr-1) and a net source of carbon (143 kg C ha-1 yr-1). The greatest flux of GHGs was via net ecosystem exchange (NEE). Terrestrial emissions of CH4 and N2O combined returned only ~5% of CO2-equivalents captured by NEE to the atmosphere, whereas evasion of CO2, CH4 and N2O from the stream surface returned ~40%. The budgets clearly show the importance of aquatic fluxes at Auchencorth Moss and highlight the potential for significant error in source/sink strength calculations if they are omitted. Furthermore, the process based understanding of soil-stream connectivity suggests the aquatic flux pathway may play an increasingly important role in the source-sink function of peatlands under future management and climate change scenarios.

M.Sc. (Zoology) / This study was undertaken to determine the osmotic regulation of Labeo capensis and to investigate the effectiveness of the addition of salt to water in which the fish are transported. The blood of L. capensis in tap water has a lower pH value than that of the same species acclimatized to salt water. It seems that the pH of fish transported in salt water is not altered immediately as in the case of fish transported in fresh water. In both groups the lowest pH values were reached two days after the fish had been transported ...

This study aims at investigating how economic inequality affects the possibilities for successful water cooperation between neighboring states sharing a transboundary watershed. As of 2019, researchers have concluded that there are 310 international river basins affecting 150 countries and 52 percent of the world’s population. Drawing on theories from research on cross-border cooperation and openness focusing on the relative attributes of bordering states, the hypothesis is that the more economically equal two bordering states are, the more they will cooperate regarding their shared waters, while the total economic development of the dyad will also have a positive effect on transboundary water cooperation. Initial regression analyses show no effect of economic inequality in a dyad on its transboundary water cooperation, while the effect of the accumulated economic development is significant. However, after including control variables on joint democracy, cultural similarities, conflict history, quality of government and region in the model, economic inequality is shown to have a statistically significant effect on transboundary water cooperation. Contrary to the predictions, this correlation is positive, which means that economic inequality between riparian states actually enhances cooperation in this study. One possible explanation may be the power imbalance economic inequality creates, which might allow the economically more powerful state to dictate the terms and impose cooperative arrangements on the weaker state that serve its own interests.

The dissertation thesis consists of five articles, bringing together results from investigations of macroinvertebrates in running waters. The use of freshwater macroinvertebrate organisms to assess environmental changes was based on the following facts: a) the presence/absence of taxa provide information about abiotic factors and/or about the pollution status of the site, b) they are indigenous and sedentary species, so that the environmental implications can be related to the site they live on, c) the organisms accumulate xenobiotic elements or compounds, thus reflecting the contaminant level in the environment. Localization of the sampling sites was related to the "hot-spots" of environmental problems. The particular investigations were carried out in the Elbe River catchment and in the Czech mountains on the selected headwater streams of the GEOMON network of the Czech Geological Survey. The Elbe was considered one of the most polluted rivers across Europe in the second half of the past century until the socio-economic transformation after 1989. The headwater streams in the Czech Republic were chosen with respect to the problem of acidification. The ability of bioaccumulation of xenobiotics in macroinvertebrate organisms was used to assess the long-term load of the Elbe ecosystem with trace...

Diante da previsão de escassez de água no mundo, torna-se necessário desenvolver tecnologias que permitem o reaproveitamento de águas salinas.A hidroponia é uma técnica de cultivo sem solo que permite obter produtos de alta qualidade, maior produção por área, menor gasto de água e insumos agrícolas, contribuindo com a preservação dos recursos naturais e do ambiente. A alface (Lactuca sativa) é a hortaliça mais importante produzida no sistema hidropônico (NFT). O uso de água salina na produção de hortaliças constitui no momento atividade essencial, tendo em vista o aumento da demanda de água doce, tanto pela atividade agrícola quanto pelo abastecimento urbano e industrial. Dessa forma os objetivos do trabalho são: i) avaliar o crescimento, a produção e qualidade de duas variedades cultivadas de alface (Verônica e Pira Roxa) em sistema hidropônico NFT (Fluxo Laminar de Nutrientes) com a utilização de águas salinas no preparo da solução nutritiva e na reposição da lâmina diária evapotranspirada ao longo do ciclo de cultivo; ii) avaliar a qualidade, os parâmetros fisiológicos e bioquímicos (teor de nitrato, clorofila e prolina). Os experimentos foram conduzidos em ambiente protegido localizado na área experimental do Setor de Irrigação e Drenagem do Departamento de Engenharia Rural da Escola Superior de Agricultura Luiz de Queiroz - ESALQ/USP, no município de Piracicaba-SP. O delineamento experimental foi blocos ao acaso. Avaliaram-se cinco níveis de salinidade obtidos com a adição de NaCl, que resultaram em diferentes condutividades elétricas da água: 0,42, 1,53, 3,52, 5,55 e 7,43 (dS.m-1) e duas variedades cultivadas de alface Verônica e Pira Roxa. Os resultados revelaram que a salinidade da água reduziu o crescimento e a produção de forma linear decrescente. A tolerância à salinidade de alface variedade cultivada Verônica foi superior em relação à variedade cultivada Pira Roxa. A salinidade alterou o teor de nitrato, prolina e clorofila, sendo o efeito superior na cv. Pira Roxa, denotando ser um mecanismo de defesa à salinidade. Com relação à produtividade comercial, obteve-se uma perda de 69% e 64% para as variedades cultivadas Pira Roxa e Verônica, respectivamente, quando se utilizou água mais salina (7,43 dS.m-1). Os resultados obtidos em sistema de cultivo NFT podem indicar a possibilidade do uso da água salina como alternativa para produção de hortaliças para produtores que tem disponibilidade de água salina e restrita disponibilidade de água doce. / Before the forescast of shortage of water in the world, becomes necessary to develop technologies that allow the reuse of saline waters. The NFT (Nutrient Film Technique) is a cultivation technique soil less that allows to obtain products of high quality, larger production for area, minor expense of water and agricultural inputs, contributing with the preservation of the natural resources and environment. A lettuce (Lactuca sativa) is the most important vegetable produced in the hydroponic system (NFT). The use of saline water in the production of vegetables constitutes in the moment essential activity, tends in view the increase of the demand of fresh water, so much for the agricultural activity as for the urban and industrial supplying. The objectives of the work were: i) to evaluate the growth, the production and quality of two cultivates of lettuce (Verônica and Pira Roxa) cultivated in hydroponic system NFT (Nutrient Film Technique) with the use of saline waters in the preparation of the nutrient solution and replacement of the evapotranspiration along the cultivation cycle; ii) to evaluate quality, the physiologic and biochemical parameters (nitrate, chlorophyll and prolina content). The experiments were carried out in atmosphere protected on the experimental area of the Irrigation and Drainage Section of the University of São Paulo (ESALQ/USP), Piracicaba, State of São Paulo, Brazil. The experimental design used was randomized blocks. It were evaluated five salinity levels obtained with the addition of NaCl that resulted in different electrical conductivities of the water (0.42, 1.53, 3.52, 5.55 and 7.43 dS.m-1); and two cultivated variety of lettuce Verônica and Pira Roxa. The results revealed that the salinity of the water reduced the growth and production in a decreasing lineal. The tolerance to salinity of the lettuce cultivated variety Verônica was superior in relation cultivated variety Pira Roxa. The salinity altered the contents of nitrate, prolina and chlorophyll, being the superior effect in the cv. Pira Roxa, denoting to be a defense mechanism the salinity. The commercial productivity was obtained a loss of 69% and 64% for cultivated variety Pira Roxa and Verônica, respectively, when more saline water was used (7,43 dS.m-1). The results obtained in cultivation system NFT they can indicate the possibility of the use of the saline water as alternative for production of vegetables for producers that has availability of saline water and restricted of fresh water.