Wednesday, 20th October 2010
The Aral Sea environmental tragedy
In October I organised a major conference on the Aral Sea in the European Parliament in Brussels. Experts from around the world addressed the conference, examining the latest analysis of the problem and searching for solutions.
A consensus emerged on some key points. Firstly, there is no shortage of water in the Aral Sea Basin. 120 kmᵌ of water is supplied annually to the Aral Sea from the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers. This is a massive amount. As a comparison, we were told about the Segura River in south eastern Spain, which flows through the driest region of the Iberian Peninsula to enter the Mediterranean Sea south of Alicante, a course of 202 miles (325 km). Like the Amu Darya, much water is drawn off the Segura to irrigate farmland, especially on the Murcia Plain. Winter and autumn floods are notorious on both rivers, but during the summer the streambeds are almost dry.
A number of dams have been built on the Segura and its tributaries to control the winter runoff. The Segura River valley also receives water from the Tagus River through a river-diversion scheme, which has been essential for irrigation in Murcia province. And yet, through careful water management, this system, with only a fraction of the flow available in the Aral Sea Basin, has been a success, meeting the drinking water and irrigation needs of the local population.
Secondly, the upstream and downstream utilisation of water in the Aral Sea Basin has been the major contributory factor to the desiccation of this huge, inland lake. No-one here today will be surprised by this news. It is well researched and well known. Nevertheless it is worth repeating simply to chart the extent of this ecological disaster.
The Aral Sea used to be the fourth largest lake in the world covering more than 40,000 square miles. This rich oasis on the Silk Road was an abundant source of food for generations of farmers, merchants, hunters and craftsmen, who came to trade and buy fish from the scores of local fishermen who plied their trade in the river deltas, lagoons and shallow straits. The Aral Sea was home to more than 38 species of fish and its surrounding forests and hinterland teemed with a rich diversity of birds and wildlife including deer, gazelle, Asiatic cheetah, lynx and even Caspian Tigers.
All of that has gone. Now a salty desert stretches further than the eye can see. The searing summer temperatures and sharp winds have whipped up dust storms which can regularly deposit millions of tonnes of toxic, chemical sand across hundreds of miles of neighbouring farmland. The disappearance of the Aral Sea has had a huge impact on climate change in the area. The rapidly extending desert has caused temperatures to rise in summer, while rainfall has decreased. In winter, severe frosts, which can see temperatures falling to minus 40 degrees centigrade, cause untold damage to farmland and crops.
How did this global ecological catastrophe happen? Sadly, it was entirely man-made! Those who think that mankind cannot cause climate change should visit the Aral Sea. It was here, in the rich, cotton and rice-growing areas of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan that the Soviets, in the 1960s, decided to build a network of canals and irrigation channels to provide water for a massive extension of the cotton crop. They had visions of this area meeting all of the cotton requirements of the USSR.
The Soviets were not the first to have grandiose plans for the Aral Sea. Historic records show that even back in the reign of Czar Peter the Great, engineers were toying with the idea of draining the Aral Sea to create what they thought would be a vast fertile wetland, capable of supplying Mother Russia with endless agricultural produce. How wrong they were!
The Karakum Canal, which is still the world’s biggest irrigation canal, was the first ambitious manifestation of this project. Started in 1954 and completed in 1988, the Karakum Canal in Turkmenistan cuts through the Karakum Desert and stretches for 870 miles or 1400 km, all the way to the Caspian Sea. But where does all the water come from to fill the world’s biggest irrigation canal in the middle of a desert? Answer...the Amu Darya.
The problem with this huge canal is that it was poorly designed and loses around 50% of its water along its length. However, it helped to irrigate great new tracts of cotton and was quickly followed by scores of other new irrigation channels, all of which diverted water from the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya rivers.
The fields of cotton flourished and when they faced a new threat from swarms of hungry locusts, the crops were sprayed with heavy doses of DDT and other poisonous pesticides. At harvest time, the cotton fields were coated with a desiccant similar to Agent Orange, to remove the green foliage from the cotton plants, so that the balls of cotton could be cleanly collected.
Meanwhile upstream, in countries like Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, whose mountains and glaciers are the source of nearly all the water in the Aral Sea Basin, monumental new hydro electric power projects were being fashioned. In Tajikistan, the Vakhsh River was blocked by a 300 metre embankment at Nurek, creating a reservoir that stretches back for over 70 km. This dam has withstood innumerable earthquakes for 40 years and the HEP plant at Nurek, producing 3000 MW, has functioned successfully for all of that time, providing most of Tajikistan’s energy needs.
Now the Tajiks are modelling a new, even greater HEP plant at Rogun, on a similar design. Rogun will have a 335 metre high embankment further down the Vakhsh River and will produce a colossal 3600 MW of electricity when fully functioning.
Needless to say, neighbouring countries like Uzbekistan are deeply concerned that such a huge dam, built in a seismic zone, could pose an ever-present threat to their downstream populations. Already suffering water shortages they are alarmed that the ten years it will take to fill the Rogun Reservoir will starve them of water. They also fear the Tajiks will have the ability to shut off the flow of water to Uzbekistan virtually at will.
To mediate on this sensitive issue, experts from the Wold Bank have been called in and will report on the viability of the project in 2011. No further work to build the 335 metre embankment and close the Vakhsh River will be undertaken until the World Bank experts have given their verdict. When I visited Rogun in September this year, there were over 5000 people employed on the site, completing the associated tunnelling and infrastructure works, which was started during Soviet times. The Tajiks are clearly confident that the World Bank will give them the green light for this project which will supply all of Tajikistan’s electricity needs and enable them to sell power to Afghanistan and Pakistan.
But, inevitably, all of these mammoth irrigation and energy schemes have had an impact. By the early 1970s, locals could already see the looming disaster. The two great rivers had been reduced to a mere trickle of water. Water from the melting snows and glaciers in the Pamir Mountains of Tajikistan was no longer reaching the Aral Sea. It was like pulling a plug out of a bath. Within only a few years, the mean water level fell from an average of over 53 metres to only 26 metres. The sea shrank to one thirteenth of its former size, retreating quickly across the desert, leaving a wilderness of desolation in its wake and emptying hundreds of lakes and waterways along the course of the rivers that fed it. Some experts predict that in 20 years time, the large Southern Aral Sea will have disappeared altogether.
Today, the toxic dust storms course around the whole of Karakalpakstan and across borders into neighbouring countries. Agricultural land has been ruined. The food chain and local water supplies have been contaminated by salt and pesticides. Humans and farm animals are born with severe handicaps and disease. Illness is rife and little tangible help seems to come from the international community. There is a standing joke in Nukus, the capital of Karakalpakstan, that if every consultant from the West who has visited the Aral Sea had brought a bucket of water, the sea would now have been filled up again! They are fed up with consultants and their endless reports in Nukus. They want action.
I visited Nukus and Muynak in the summer of this year. In Muynak the rotting hulks of fishing vessels litter the desert. This is the only desert in the world where you can find rusting fishing boats! These boats once landed over 30,000 tonnes of fish a year in Muynak. Today, you have to travel more than 100 miles from Muynak to reach the sea. Unbelievably this global catastrophe did not take centuries to materialise. It happened in the course of one generation.
So what can be done?
The impact of the disappearing Aral Sea on the 48 million people who live in the Aral Sea Basin is appalling. Water is a resource. When it disappears there are enormous economic consequences. This is why we look to all states neighbouring the Aral Sea to take ownership of this problem. They are the ones at risk. They will be the biggest losers. Mass migration of environmental refugees may be the end result and this may only be the tip of the iceberg. We must realise the security implications of climate change.
We need better land use in the basin. The continuing production of cotton – the most water hungry crop ever – is at the root of the problem.
There is a need for integrated water management to be introduced across the Aral Sea basin. At a regional scale, future water use is the key to recovery of the Aral Sea. Local farmers are making improvements, but they need help and encouragement to do more. 60% of water is currently being lost in poorly designed irrigation channels and inefficient systems. Drip irrigation will have to be introduced, but is costly and will have to be imported. Such projects need financial assistance.
In Central Asia there is a huge puzzle of conflicting interests. Coordination is essential. The EU has a big interest in this issue as a major donor. We rely on IFAS to build partnerships and welcome today’s donor conference. We need to strengthen dialogue between all the parties. There needs to be full cooperation with the OSCE. Enhancing stakeholder involvement is imperative. We need sustainable methods of water management and there must be a shared approach to the whole basin. That means better coordination and better consultation on the big projects both upstream and downstream. It means taking expert advice from the world’s leading specialists before rushing ahead with projects like the Golden Century Lake in the North Karakum Desert in Turkmenistan, or the Rogun HEP project in Tajikistan, or Karambata 2 in Kyrgyzstan.
We need to aim for mutually beneficial trans-boundary water agreements. Such agreements cannot be imposed from outside. This is up to the Central Asian republics themselves. It requires political will. Water based peace means constructive dialogue between states, taking into account the needs of social users.
But already there are signs of success. The northern or small Aral Sea in Kazakhstan has been dammed and re-constituted at an average depth of 45 metres. Fish stocks have made a strong comeback with 7 species now being fished commercially. Fish catches have increased tenfold in recent years and other rural industries have been revived, with horses, sheep and cattle thriving in the farmland surrounding the re-constituted sea.
Pioneering work in Muynak in Uzbekistan needs to be encouraged and properly resourced. A new lake has been constructed and fish have been re-introduced. Large areas of land are being planted with salt-resistant varieties of trees.
The West can help too. The Aral Sea is a tragic laboratory of climate change. The environment, ecology, biodiversity and life itself can be wiped out in a single generation in the pursuit of profit. Let us learn the lessons of the Aral Sea and vow never to allow such devastation to happen again anywhere on our planet.
