Abstract for: Springing Towards Understanding the Dynamics of Transboundary Groundwater Data Sharing and Its Effect on Management

In order to manage groundwater between two or more countries, we must measure the resource and understand the interlinkages between key variables for the region of interest. Monitoring wells, data, and models are some of the resources needed for effective management. What should we do when funding, rivers, and soils are drying up? How does data sharing and modeling influence trust and cooperation to prevent groundwater depletion? We are building a causal loop diagram that will serve as the structural hypothesis and boundary of our problem space. The CLD will guide our simulation modeling efforts. The goal of the simulation model is to understand how much funding is needed to maintain a high level of trust and data sharing amongst the transboundary aquifer countries. Further work in this problem area is to collaborate with economists and stakeholders such as funders and monitoring organizations to understand, model and provide potential solutions to the resource and funding constraint problems.