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 Informal
Planning MeetingWater, Climate, and Development Issues in the Amudarya Basin 18-19 June 2002 The
Franklin Institute Since the mid-1980s, the Aral Sea basin in general, and the Aral Sea specifically, have become a focus of attention. Environmentalists from around the globe became witness to the demise of the Aral Sea and to land degradation throughout the basin. Some observershave argued that the reduced flow into the Aral Sea and its consequent shrinkage was the result of regional, if not global, long-term changes in climate (and snowmelt) conditions. Others argue that the demise of the Sea and the reduced streamflow were the direct and sole result of river-water diversions from the region's two major rivers, the Amudarya and the Syrdarya. Most references to the Aral Sea basin states refer to the five former Soviet Central Asian Republics, now independent states: Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Kyrgystan, and Kazakhstan. They do not (and have not) include Afghanistan. Afghanistan was not under Soviet control. It was an independent state, and it has been involved in wars for the past two decades. These wars and internal conflicts put development issues on the "back burner" during those decades, if not longer. However, the wars are over. The Taliban has been deposed from power and replaced by a newly constituted government. Donor governments and agencies and humanitarian organizations are rushing into the region to provide funds for economic development and humanitarian purposes. And Afghanistan encompasses about 17% of the Aral Sea basin. The new Afghanistan will need water, and that water is likely to be drawn from the water resources in the Amudarya [river] basin. What might be the new government's water needs? How will it fare in its negotiations with some of the Central Asian Republics for a share of the Amudarya water? What are the water issues in the Amudarya basin? Will the water diversion projects proposed by the Soviet Union in the 1970s to bring water to its arid Central Asian regions be on the negotiating table once again? And what about the future of the Karakum Canal? These and other questions were addressed at the Informal Planning Meeting (IPM) on Water, Climate and Development in the Amudarya Basin." The results of the IPM are available in the above documents. |
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