The Environmental disaster
Until the 1960s, the Aral Sea was one of the largest inland seas on the planet. It lies in the west of Central Asia, between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, and has a long history. Forty years ago, the Aral Sea was the world’s fourth largest inland sea, 12 times as large as Vänern. Since then, half the area of this sea and more than two-thirds of its water have disappeared, leaving behind mile after mile of dry, salt-encrusted lake bed. This occurred because large-scale cotton growing with enormous irrigation facilities was forced through so that the Soviet Union could become self-sufficient in cotton production. The water was taken from the two rivers that feed the Aral Sea, where one-third of the water originally came from the river Syr Darya and two-thirds from the river Amu Darya. Through systematic diversion of the water from these rivers to highly inefficient irrigation systems, the Aral Sea lost almost all its water supply (98%). This led to the Aral Sea rapidly drying up.
Today (2007), the remaining sea is divided into five small lakes. Only the most northerly of these, the Little Aral Sea, now has an inflow of water and can once again produce fish. The other lakes have such a high salt content that they cannot sustain life. The situation for the people and animal species living around the former Aral Sea shores is becoming increasingly serious. The five lakes are continuing to dry up. Many of us have seen the striking and alarming pictures of large fishing boats lying stranded on an enormous expanse of sand. The human tragedies that have followed in the footsteps of this disaster have not been revealed as clearly. Unemployment, poverty and disease have taken over in the former thriving coastal landscape. Large amounts of dried salt, mineral fertilisers and pesticide residues that have accumulated over a number of decades have been spread by the wind and are now poisoning the soil, the air and the groundwater. Fishing has disappeared, factories have closed and schools and the healthcare system have been impoverished.
A abandoned fishing boat in Muynaks former harbor.We still do not know the full extent of the damage to the ecosystem or the effects on food, drinking water and the spread of disease that are the aftermath of poverty and environmental degradation. Women and children are the worst affected. Child mortality here is among the highest in the entire former Soviet Union. Today few babies are born fit and healthy and practically all infants are anaemic. Anaemia is also common among pregnant women, leading to complications in childbirth.
The destruction of the Aral Sea is one of the greatest crimes against nature in our time, caused by man. It shows painfully clearly the consequences of short-term exploitation of nature for financial gain. The decisions that led to this disaster must be replaced by decisions that restore to the inhabitants of the Aral Sea area their health and their potential to again support themselves on this once so productive ecosystem.
