The World Meteorological Organization’s State of the Climate in Asia 2024 report warns that the region is warming nearly twice as fast as the global average, driving more extreme weather and posing serious threats to lives, ecosystems, and economies. In 2024, Asia experienced its warmest or second warmest year on …
Areas in green show where water has turned into land and those in blue show where land has become water Scientists have used satellite images to study how the water on the Earth's surface has changed over 30 years. They found that 115,000 sq km (44,000 sq miles) of land …
The eastern basin of the Aral Sea — formerly one of the four largest lakes in the world — has for the first time dried up completely, according to latest images released by Nasa. The once-extensive lake in Central Asia has been shrinking markedly since the 1960s, but for the …
A large section of the Aral Sea has completely dried up for the first time in modern history, according to Nasa. Images from the US space agency’s Terra satellite released last week show that the eastern basin of the Central Asian inland sea – which stretched across Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan …
A report from the UN and the CGIAR consortium reveals that land degradation due to salt build-up is causing damages in some 75 countries, estimated at more than US$27 billion per year. The study, carried out by the UN University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH), the International Center …
Field observations in Central Asia indicate that the climate has been warming and the consequences of this trend have already been observed. Disasters related to climate change destroy settlements, agricultural land, and infrastructure. Central Asian countries should therefore develop resilience and adapt to climate change. This report shows the results …
This report focuses on water, an increasingly strategic resource in the Central Asian region for economic and social development. Says that the region as a whole is relatively well endowed in water resources but lacks good national and regional management frameworks. There are significant
As scientists worry about the prospect of a catastrophic flood from Lake Sarez in the Pamir Mountains, agricultural communities on the plains below face a very different problem. This arid region in Central Asia has inherited a set of resource blunders made decades ago by the Soviet Union. And since …
food security Ethiopia defends land grab Ethiopia, where 20 per cent of the people are in urgent need of food aid, defended its plan to offer 2.7 million hectares (ha) cultivable land to foreign companies.
The overall goal of this report and the accompanying report summarizing the findings and recommendations, both based on the economic and sector work (ESW), is to advance the understanding and integration in operational terms of environmental water allocation into integrated water resources management. The specific objectives of the reports are: …
This document represents the collective expertise of a diverse group of individuals concerned with ecosystem degradation, and the continuing loss of the services provided by these ecosystems. Attention is given to aquatic ecosystems because of water`s fundamental role as the `blood` of ecosystem structure and functions, and an engine of …
The concept of ecosystem services has received significant attention since the appearance of the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment(MA). Ecosystem services are the benefits people obtain from ecosystems. The MA has subdivided ecosystem services into four categories: provisioning such as the production of food and water; regulating, such as the control of …
The surface of our planet is mainly water, yet usable water is in short supply. In some parts of Africa people have to walk several kilometres a day to get water, and they are the lucky ones. There, and in Asia, the prospect of conflicts over water is increasing. A …
The Aral Sea in Central Asia was the fourth-largest lake on the planet in 1960. By 2007 it had shrunk to 10 percent of its original size. Widespread, wasteful irrigation of the deserts along the Amu and Syr rivers, which feed the Aral, cut the freshwater inflow to a trickle. …
This report gives an overview of major environmental and socio-economic challenges that the Aral Sea region is facing, threats to the sustainable management of lake basin, major measures supported by the governments and international donor organizations aimed to address these critical environmental problems, and lessons learned from the environmental cooperation …
a new study is yet another proof of the fact that an environmental apocalypse can have wide-ranging impacts. Researchers studying the population living near central Asia's shrinking Aral Sea have found that the residents exhibit a high level of dna damage, which is linked with the region's alarmingly cancer rates. …
Kazakhstan's waterbodies seem to be eternally mismanaged. Lack of vision saw the Aral Sea, which flows through Central Asia, shrink to a third of its actual size. Today, Balkhash lake faces a similar crisis in the country. It may be noted that Ili river emerges from neighbouring China and provides …
the Aral Sea, formerly the world's fourth-largest inland sea with an area of 65,000 sq km may not die after all ( Down To Earth, Vol 4, No 12). Kazakh fisherfolk believe that a 16-km-long dam built across Aral Sea, mainly separating Aral Sea Minor (northern part of the Sea) …
THF battle to save the Aral sea (Down To Earth, Vol 4, No 12), which has been on for several years now, is plagued by a dearth of solutions. "They are compiling voluminous reports, listing developments and sending sporadic humanitarian relief. Yet, they have so far failed to come up …
This publication focusses on the Aral Sea crisis - the result of economic processes set in motion by the planners of the erstwhile Soviet Union in the 1950s. It is one of the biggest ecological disasters, second only to Chernobyl, leading to a total collapse of the socio-economic life of …
