International conference Development of cooperation in the Aral Sea Basin to mitigate consequences of environmental catastrophe
Aral Sea and Aral Sea Basin issues
One of the greatest global environmental disasters of modern times is the tragedy of the Aral Sea, which the countries of Central Asia and their populations of some 60 million are facing. Its environmental, climatic, socioeconomic and humanitarian consequences make it a direct threat to sustainable development in the region, and to the health, gene pool and future of the people living there. The Aral Sea crisis directly affects Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, and indirectly – Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.
Since the 1990s, the states of Central Asia have been undertaking all efforts to mitigate this environmental disaster, but their resources and physical capacity fall short, and the assistance provided by international donors remains limited and inadequate to fully address the problems of the Aral Sea area. As the borders of the area affected by the environmental crisis continue to expand, the scale of the crisis will become ever more disastrous, with far-reaching consequences not only for countries in the region but also far beyond its borders, unless additional assistance from the international community is brought to bear.
The Aral Sea catastrophe stands as convincing evidence of the interplay between the environment and strategic security. For this reason, the countries in the region affected by the catastrophe are appealing to the international community for the fact that desiccation of the Aral Sea will have damaging effects not only locally, but also globally.
Until 1960, the Aral Sea among the largest endorheic water bodies in the world. It was 426 kilometers long and 284 kilometers wide, with an area of 68,900 square kilometers, water volume of 1,083 cubic kilometers, and a maximum depth of 68 m.
The Aral Sea region had a large variety of flora and fauna, its waters contained 38 species of fish; it served as habitat for a number of rare and endemic animals, among which is the Saiga antelopes; and its flora included 638 species of higher plants.
The Aral Sea played a vital role in the development of the regional economy, its industries, sources of employment and sustainable social infrastructure. In the past, there used to be richest fisheries in the world: 30,000 to 35,000 tons of fish were caught annually in the waters of the Aral Sea. More than 80 per cent of those living along the Aral Sea shore were employed in catching, processing and transporting fish and fish products. The fertile lands of the Amu Darya and Syr Darya deltas and the rich grazing lands provided employment for more than 100,000 people in livestock rearing, poultry breeding and cultivating agricultural crops.
The Aral Sea also served to regulate the climate and mitigated sharp fluctuations in the weather throughout the region, exerting a positive influence on living conditions, agriculture and the environment.
The problems of the Aral Sea arose and expanded into a threat in the 1960s, as a result of the feckless regulation of the major cross-border rivers in the region — the Syr Darya and Amu Darya, which had previously provided some 56 cubic kilometers of water to the Aral Sea each year. Rise in the population of the area, urbanization, intensive land development and construction of major hydro technical and irrigation facilities on the water courses of the Aral Sea basin carried out in previous years without regard for environmental consequences led to the desiccation of one of the most beautiful water bodies on the planet. Within a single generation, an entire sea was virtually destroyed. The process of environmental degradation continues, and the Aral Sea region is becoming a lifeless wasteland.
Over the past 50 years, the total outflow from rivers into the Aral Sea has fallen almost 4.5 times, to an average of 12.7 cubic kilometers. The water surface has shrunk by eight times and the volume has decreased by more than a factor of 13. The water level, which until 1960 had reached a maximum of 53.4 meters, has fallen by 29 meters. Salinity has increased by up to 25 times and is now 11 times higher than the average mineralization of the world ocean.
The salty Aralkum desert with a surface area of more than 5.5 million hectares is inexorably taking over the Aral region and now covers the dried-up portion of the sea that was once home to rich flora and fauna and served as the natural climatic regulator of the adjacent areas. Constant environmental risk, with its negative impact on the quality of life, health and, most importantly, the population’s gene pool now affects not only the areas around the Aral Sea, but the whole region of Central Asia.
More than 75 million tons of dust and toxic salts enter the atmosphere annually from the Aral Sea. The dust plumes that rise from the bottom are up to 400 kilometers long and 40 kilometers wide. According to scientists, the dust from the Aral Sea is already embedded in the glaciers of the Pamir and Tian Shan Mountains, as well as the Arctic.
A complex set of ecological-climatic, socioeconomic and demographic problems with far-reaching global consequences has arisen in the Aral Sea region.
Since the early 1960s, the number of days on which the temperature has exceeded 40 C has doubled, and temperatures of 49 C in the shade have been recorded in places.
Water pollution and salt and dust discharge from the bottom of the desiccated sea have contributed to the spread of a number of diseases of such organs as kidney, blood, digestive system, respiratory organs, cardiovascular system, as well as gallstones and anemia among the population of the Aral Sea area. Children are particularly vulnerable to these impacts. The dioxin levels in the blood of pregnant women and milk of breastfeeding mothers in Karakalpakstan are five times higher than in Europe.
The decline of the Aral Sea’s role as a transport corridor, and in fishing, animal husbandry and other types of economic activity, shrinkage of grassland and reduced soil productivity have deprived tens of thousands of people of their traditional livelihoods.
More than half of the plant and animal gene pool of the Aral Sea area has disappeared. 11 species of fish, 12 species of mammals, 26 bird species and 11 species of plants are nearly extinct.
A brief catalogue of the consequences of the destruction of the Aral Sea would include a shortage of drinking water and a drop in its quality; soil pollution and degradation; a sharp decrease in biodiversity, the worsening of public health and the gene pool; climate change caused by smog in the atmosphere and, possibly, a consequent shrinkage of ice caps in the Pamirs and Tian Shan, which, to a large extent, feed the main rivers in the region.
Since the 1990s, all countries suffering from the destructive consequences of the Aral Sea catastrophe have spoken out at the United Nations Assemblies and at other international and regional organizations to alert the international community to the problems of the Aral Sea and their close connection with regional and global security. On September, 28, 1993, during the forty-eighth session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, and on October, 24, 1995, during the fiftieth session, representatives of the countries of Central Asia appealed to the international community to provide assistance in saving the Aral Sea and the surrounding region, and warned that this problem could not be resolved without the support and assistance of international financial institutions and developed countries with the United Nations in a coordinating role.
On 8 September 2000, at the United Nations Millennium Summit in New York, President of the Republic of Uzbekistan, Islam Karimov proposed the establishment of a council on the problems of the Aral Sea and surrounding region, under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in the interests of promoting international cooperation in environmental protection.
The countries in the region now have every reason to be grateful for the significant assistance provided by the United Nations, international bodies and donor countries in mitigating the consequences of the Aral Sea crisis.
The countries and the population of the Aral Sea region welcome the commitment of the United Nations and its Secretary-General in addressing global environmental problems, including the Aral disaster. The visit of the Secretary-General to the Aral Sea region on 4 and 5 April 2010, during which he confirmed the global consequences of the Aral Sea crisis and the need to mobilize the efforts of the international community to resolve it, provided clear indication of this. Following his visit, the Secretary-General described the destruction of the Aral Sea as “one of the worst environmental disasters in the world” and stated that its resolution was the “collective responsibility of the whole world, not only of the nations of Central Asia”.
The most significant measures have been focused on resolving water shortages and desertification; reducing water consumption; countering the salinization and degradation of land under cultivation; improving public access to drinking water; and establishing the infrastructure needed to treat diseases caused by changes in the environment and climate in the region.
Over 1.2 billion dollars have been invested for these efforts over the past 10 years in Uzbekistan alone.
In 2011 the 68,700-hectare Lower Amu Darya State Biosphere Reserve was created for the purpose of preserving and restoring the land, flora and fauna, and to stimulate economic and human development.
The implementation of the first round of the project, entitled “Creation of local bodies of water in the Amu Darya delta” helped to bring into operation five water drainage facilities, establish 45 kilometers of shore protection dams, and create water-regulation reservoirs with a water surface area of 70,000 hectares and an overall volume of 810 million cubic meters. Over the past 15 years, 180,000 hectares of the Amu Darya River delta have been irrigated, and local lakes have been created. There are plans to expand their surface area up to 230,000 hectares.
On the area affected by the Aral Sea crisis, 740,000 hectares of forest were planted, including 310,000 hectares on the desiccated seabed, and there are plans to plant on additional 200,000 hectares of desiccated seabed over the next few years. In Karakalpakstan over the last 15 years, about 1,700 kilometers of drainage networks have been brought into operation in rural areas, the provision of drinking water to the population has increased almost fourfold, and more than 100 rural medical polyclinics, most of the maternity hospitals now operating in the area and a national oncology center was built, reconstructed and supplied with medical equipment. Between 1997 and 2012, modern outpatient polyclinics with a capacity of 32,600 visits per shift were brought into operation in the Republic of Karakalpakstan and Khorezm, Bukhara and Navoiy regions. Hospitals were built and reconstructed, providing a capacity of 5,800 beds; and 840 rural medical centers are in operation. As a result, in comparison with 1997, the number of congenital abnormalities in the Republic of Karakalpakstan was reduced by a factor of 3.1, maternal mortality halved and infant mortality decreased by a factor of 2.4.
In this connection, there is a need to adopt as an official document of the sixty-eighth session of the General Assembly the Programme of measures on eliminating the consequences of the drying up of the Aral Sea and averting the catastrophe of the ecological systems in the Aral Sea region, including the implementation of the following fundamentally important stabilization measures:
I. Creation of conditions for life, reproduction and preservation of the gene pool in the Aral Sea region.
This primarily has to do with providing the population with clean drinking water, development of the social infrastructure, improving preventive and medical services, and stimulating employment and income growth.
Particular attention is to be paid to the implementation of projects to protect the health of mothers and children, improve rural medical facilities and update equipment at those facilities.
II. Improved measures to manage and save water. Protect natural water bodies in the Aral Sea catchment area. This has to do with the formation and development of available bodies of water in the Amu Darya River delta, devising agreed mechanisms for management and protection of water resources in the Aral Sea basin, and introducing integrated management of water resources in the basins of the Amu Darya and Syr Darya Rivers.
Reconstruction of irrigation and drainage systems and introduction of modern water-saving irrigation technologies are of paramount importance here.
III. Implementation of large-scale afforestation activities on the desiccated bed of the Aral Sea and prevent desertification in the region.
Measures to prevent erosion, to stop and stabilize moving sands and prevent harmful salt and sand particles from rising into the air are among the key activities here.
IV. Preservation of biodiversity, restoration of biological resources and protection of flora and fauna.
Special attention will be devoted to preservation and protection of disappearing flora and fauna, creation of nurseries for preserving (restoring) their gene pool, expansion of protected natural territories in the Aral Sea region, introduction of a stable system of managing wetlands and preservation of grazing lands.
V. Further institutional reinforcement and strengthening of cooperation between countries in the region within the framework of the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea and stepped-up efforts to alert the international community to the Aral Sea catastrophe.
We are all well aware of the fact that restoration of the sea to its previous shape and volume is not possible. This process has gone too far that it cannot be reversed. The process of solving the issues arisen is very difficult. First of all it is important to help people residing around the dying sea, in the Aral Sea Basin as a whole and stabilize the ecosystem.
Ever aggravating detrimental situation in the Aral Sea basin and the surrounding area provides compels carrying out additional measures to overcome the disastrous effects of the Aral Sea desiccation, creating necessary socio-ecological and humanitarian conditions for living more than 60 million people residing here.
The scale of the challenges to be dictated by the need for more effective coordination, pooling of resources at national, regional and international levels to prevent even far-reaching consequences of the disaster in the area.
