The report highlights
water, agriculture, energy and climate change
issues in Central Asia’s Amu Darya River
Basin
Hydropower Projects,
Inefficient Irrigation Systems, Growing
Populations and Climate Change Emerging
as Key Challenges for Environmental Diplomacy
Geneva, 11 July 2011
- -Boosting cooperation between countries
sharing the waters of the Amu Darya, Central
Asia's longest river, could be key to future
peace and security in the region a new report
launched today by the United Nations Environment
Programme (UNEP) says.
Big hydropower projects
planned upstream, demand for irrigated agriculture
downstream and growing concern that climate
change is shifting weather patterns are
emerging as major natural resource challenges
for the four main nations involved - Afghanistan,
Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
The new report, prepared
by UNEP on behalf of partners in the Environment
and Security Initiative (ENVSEC), points
out that water resources in the region are
already impacted by decades of often unsustainable
development dating back to the era of the
Soviet Union.
Large-scale engineering
projects dammed and diverted substantial
flows from the Amu Darya river basin into
activities such as cotton, wheat and fodder
farming in arid and desert regions. Such
projects have also contributed to increased
land degradation and damage to soils.
The Aral Sea, which
relies in part from water from the Amu Darya,
remains severely degraded with the report's
estimates indicating that "the volume
and surface area of the sea have now decreased
tenfold".
Water levels in the
southern part have dropped by 26 meters
and the shoreline there has now receded
by several hundred kilometers, says the
report Environment and Security in the Amu
Darya Basin.
Across the Amu Darya
basin there is growing concern over declining
water quality with and implications for
human health including increased incidence
of kidney, thyroid and liver diseases. This
is being linked with chemicals run off from
cultivated land and the washing of soils
in the winter to reduce salt levels.
The report notes that
between 1960 and 11000 the average salt
content of water in the lower Amu Darya
basin more than doubled and "has not
improved since".
Pollution from mining,
metals, petroleum and chemicals activities
along the river system and air pollution
in the form of dust and salt from dried
out parts of the Aral Sea are also pinpointed
as challenges to human health.
Achim Steiner, UN Under-Secretary
General and UNEP Executive Director, said:
"As early as 1994, research identified
the Amu Darya delta as an environment and
security hotspot and these concerns are
increasing rather than receding".
"From a security
perspective climate change, water, energy
and agriculture constitute the main areas
of interest for this report as they reveal
the potential for increasing instability
and even confrontation as more flows are
impounded upstream reducing those water
availability and quality downstream,"
he added.
"Trust building,
re-thinking agricultural production including
irrigation systems and fostering cooperation
on shared resources and infrastructure will
be key to sustainable development in this
part of Central Asia. The report sets out
clear recommendations on how this can be
achieved in a partnership between the countries
concerned and the international community,"
said Mr Steiner.
The new report details
persistent, new and emerging stresses which
will require environmental diplomacy to
boost cooperation, especially around flashpoints
between the nations sharing the Amu Darya.
Climate Change
"Temperatures are
projected to rise by 2-3 degrees C in the
next 50 years. Such an increase in temperatures
could lead to significant environmental
changes, some of which are already happening,"
says the report based on the special report
of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change, The Regional Impacts of Climate
Change: An Assessment of Vulnerability.
For example there has
been a significant loss of glaciers in the
mountains of Central Asia since the latter
part of the 20th century which is continuing.
Many large glaciers have retreated by several
hundred meters and hundreds of small glaciers
have vanished altogether.
Along with snow melt
and rainfall, the glaciers in locations
such as the Pamir Mountains are key to river
flows in the Amu Darya.
"With rapid population
growth in Central Asia, rising demand for
water in agriculture may produce a situation
of water scarcity in rivers shared by several
countries," says the report, adding
that reduced water flows could also lead
to further challenges including impacts
on biodiversity, increased silting up of
reservoirs and more widespread land degradation.
Irrigated Agriculture
The report notes that
water use, a great deal of which is used
for irrigated agriculture, is high. Yet
only a fraction of the 7,000-12,000 cubic
meters per hectare is actually reaching
the fields and crops.
Indeed it is estimated
that more than half is lost due to, for
example, leaks in canals and evaporation.
Countries are acting.
Uzbekistan for example has launched several
multi-million dollar projects to re-build
its part of the irrigation network including
pumping stations with the aim of improving
the prospects for over 200,000 hectares
of irrigated land.
Meanwhile the country
is also drafting new water laws and investing
in advanced irrigation systems and automated
water management technologies to cut consumption.
The report suggests
improved 'hydro-meteorological' monitoring
and forecasting in the upper Amu Darya basin
and closer ties in terms of water use between
Afghanistan and the other key countries.
Currently Afghanistan is outside the regional
water management framework.
"Increasing land
under irrigation by 20 per cent would increase
total Afghan extraction to five-six cubic
kilometers. The amount of water extracted
- although still slight - is far from negligible
particularly in the context of dry years,"
says the report.
Meanwhile, part of Afghanistan's
long-term reconstruction plans involve increasing
the amount and reliability of energy supplies
via new hydropower developments with implications
for water supplies downstream.
Hydropower
The report says that
"recurrent extreme climatic conditions
such as drought and extreme winter temperatures,
combined with an increase in domestic and
regional energy demand, have convinced upstream
countries that it is necessary to develop
their energy resources, especially hydropower".
Afghanistan and Tajikistan
for example are discussing plans to build
the large 4,000 MW Dusht-i-Jum hydropower
station on the Panj River, a tributary of
the Amu Darya.
Tajikistan has also
has resumed development of the Rogun dam
on another tributary, the Vakhsh River,
which will add 3,600 MW to the country's
installed energy capacity.
"These projects
have prompted a strong reaction from downstream
countries,' says the report.
Recommendations
The report acknowledges
that governments in the region are starting
to move on many of the challenges but that
a great deal more can be achieved to promote
cooperative sustainable development and
reduce tensions over finite natural resources.
It suggests that a good
first step would be for relevant nations
to ratify the UN Economic Commission for
Europe's Convention on the Protection and
Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International
Lakes.
This would serve the
objective of establishing a legal framework
and accountability for the collective management
of the Amu Darya basin's resources.
The report also calls
for more exchange of information between
countries on proposed transbounary projects
that may impact the Amu Darya as one important
mechanism for building trust and promoting
cooperation.
Countries in the region
should consider burden sharing in terms
of maintaining water infrastructure while
also promoting water efficiency measures
and technologies.
Consultation on the
costs and principles underpinning a fair,
properly operated and balanced water systems
should be carried out by the riparian states.
Modernization of regional
energy systems and electricity grids should
continue which, backed by improved energy
efficiency and the development of alternative
energy sources could reduce the need for
increased hydropower projects.
Notes to Editors
ENVSEC was launched
in May 2003. Its members are UNEP, the UN
Development Programme (UNDP), the Organization
for Security and Co-Operation in Europe
(OSCE); the UN Economic Commission for Europe,
the Regional Environmental Centre for Central
and Eastern Europe and the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization (NATO)
www.envsec.org
