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A systems approach to validating the water vision of the Aral Sea Basin

Abstract: The governments of the Aral Sea Basin countries, in cooperation with international organizations (UNESCO and World Bank) came up with a “water vision “for the region until 2025. The landlocked Aral Sea has been suffering from an imbalance in water evaporation, and, water inflow from its two main sources — Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers, when the planners in the former Soviet Union from the 1960s diverted the river waters for irrigation. The irrigated area has increased from the 1960s by two‐thirds to 7 million hectares and the population by three‐fold to 50 million in the basin countries. Consequently the inflow to the Aral Sea from these two rivers decreased from 55 km3 in 1960 to a few km3 during the 1980s and 1990s. This has resulted in one of the worst man‐made ecological disasters of the century. In this paper, we examine different scenarios to achieve the vision goals and whether it is indeed feasible. Using IWMI basin‐oriented water accounting principles, we have shown that significant amount of water is being wasted in the region. Our analysis concludes that though not all the vision goals are likely to be met over the next 25 years, the inflow into the Aral Sea can be increased to over 20 km3 through better management and use of water resources.