Based on chemical analyses, the quality of ground waters for drinking, agricultural and industrial purposes was deter-mined in Rafsanjan Plain-Iran. Samples for analyses were taken from 22 wells in 2012. Because of high water hardness and total dissolved solids content, water was found to be unsuitable for drinking purposes. Water quality for agriculture was determined with the use of the Wilcox method. Among the analysed water, 10.33% were attributed to C3-S1 class (high electrolytic conductivity and low sodium adsorption ratio), 59.5% to class C4-S1 (very high EC and low SAR) and 30.17% to class C4-S2 (very high EC and medium SAR). 89.67% of studied wells were unsuitable for agriculture. Because of corro-sive water properties all but two wells on Rafsanjan Plain were undesirable for use in the industry. The results of qualitative analyses were presented in GIS and in databases to support making decision and management of groundwater on Rafsanjan Plain.
The paper presents the problem of the growing water deficit and the possibility of sustainable development of water resources in rural areas of Central and Eastern Europe (using the example of Poland). It is estimated that the amount of resources in this region is reduced by about 70% compared to the average for Europe. In drought periods it comes to limitation of economic activity, including agriculture. Particular attention was paid to the necessity to extend landscape, underground, and snow retention, as an alternative to dams, which are currently the most popular in lower-order catchments. It has been shown that the construction of small agricultural reservoirs is not always preceded by adequate consultations and pre-design studies, which may result in financial losses and legal problems. Simultaneous use of many alternative forms of retention should be more effective than the implementation of reservoirs. In addition, increasing the hydraulic roughness of the catchments slows down the outflow of products of erosion and contributes to the protection of surface retention structures (maintaining natural and economic usefulness of reservoirs).