The Aral Sea: A Story of Despair and Redemption

As unfortunate as it is true, the media is full of stories of how prominent environmental features have been squandered due to the greed of modern day society. Take, for instance, the state of rivers in dense urban areas. China's Yangtze, Han, and Jianhe Rivers are but a few examples of how poor waste management, chemical runoff, and disregard for natural resources can leave water sources polluted, poisonous, and colored in a very unnatural palette. 

Pollution of Biblical proportions in the Jianhe, Credit

However, not every tale of environmental woe ends so disturbingly; some even seem to have a happy(-ish) ending. The case is such for a body of water that sits on the boarder of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan, a once mighty sea called the Aral.

The Aral Sea was once the the fourth largest landlocked body of water in the world at 26,000 square miles. It was a mecca of fishing and hosted over 20 towns and villages whose people prospered in their trade. However, in the early1960's the Soviet Union diverted water from its main influx--the Amu Darya--to support the irrigation of water-heavy agriculture in the famously arid surrounding steppes.

By the 1980's, the sea had such a reduced influx of fresh water that it retreated from its banks and dried up significantly, to the point where a once great body of water  has become three distinct bodies, one of which is threatening to dry completely this year. As evaporation continued the sea become so saline that the fishery collapsed, and with it disappeared 24 species of endemic fish.

The Aral Sea in 1989 (left) and 2008, Credit

When the fishery vanished, so did the livelihoods of thousands of fishermen, cannery workers, and railroad workers. The Aral shrank to about half its size by 1985, and with it shrank the populations that once lined its shores. Those that decided to stay behind on the now arid plains found themselves without food or work in a land turned severe without the Aral there to buffer temperatures. Pesticides left in the soil from Soviet Agricultural runoff caused cancer and respiratory disease, and without fish, protein deficiency ran rampant and infant mortality increased.

Fishing vessels left in the sand, Credit

After Kazakhstan became independent in 1991, efforts to restore the Aral began. A dam was constructed to isolate the Southern basin from the North Sea, with the hopes that the trickle coming in from the Syr Darya would restore the North Aral. And slowly, it did. By 2005, a permanent eight-mile dam was constructed in its place, and this raised the North Aral by about 13 feet more, which lowered the levels of salinity and allowed fish to repopulate. In only about eight months, the North Aral grew by 20%. Native plants and birds returned as well, a good omen for any restoration.

Some fishing operations have resumed in the north, though on a much smaller scale than in the 1960s. The canneries are reopening and once-residents are returning to begin a new. However, while the North Aral has been somewhat of a success story, the same cannot be said for the South Aral. Much and more has been lost, and perhaps will never fill again.

While progress may be slow, it is clearly there. Locals hope that with help from the Kazakh government, World Bank, and expert scientists, the Aral may one day refill and flourish beyond any past prosperity.

Adapted from [Aral Sea Recovery?]