When oil starts losing value, countries begin competing for water

The water shortage in Central Asia is turning into a real threat to people and the environment, more so than the shortage of oil and natural gas in a region with astounding reserves of fossil fuels. This summer the region faces water shortages because the quantity of snow has shrunk by half, and the level of water in the Amu Darya, the main river of Central Asia, is 50-60 percent below normal.

Most experts openly state that the countries of Central Asia have much more water than is required by their populations and economies. Solving the water problems is a key to stability in the region as it becomes an increasingly important oil supplier. Our correspondent Hanna Hopko recently came back from Turkmenistan, where she covered the meeting of Central Asia experts within the framework of the UN initiative “Environment and Security.” Below, she reports on how potential conflicts over water supply may be avoided and how to fairly apportion water reserves.

FREE WATER DOES NOT TEACH PEOPLE TO VALUE THIS GIFT OF NATURE

Ashgabat, the capital of Turkmenistan, is a dynamic city. New residential districts with marble buildings are springing up, along with puppet theaters, circuses, museums, and skating rinks. Visitors are impressed by the 20-meter- high golden statue of Turkmenbashi in downtown Ashgabat, which is scheduled for relocation to the southern edge of the city. This is the apogee of the local cult of personality, a phenomenon that is observed in many Central Asian countries.

Every Ukrainian driver would have liked to live in Turkmenistan before 2007, when you could buy 60 liters of gas for 1 dollar. Prices have gone up, and today one dollar buys you only 10 liters. Every Turkman with a car gets 120 liters of gas for free each month. People don’t pay for electricity or natural gas either. Utilities cost $20 a year, at most, and a teacher’s average monthly salary is $80. This is a social paradise compared to Ukraine, where you have to pay for everything.

Most importantly, water is also free in Turkmenistan, and residents get as much as they need. This situation has sparked a careless attitude to this vital resource: everywhere in central parks you can see large man-made lakes. Water flowing from a constantly running tap floods flowerbeds instead of watering them. As a result, many districts of Ashgabat have become saline. People living in apartment buildings also do not turn off their water taps. There is no water conservation anywhere: neither in everyday life nor in manufacturing-as long as water is free.

The realization that oil and natural gas will never replace water has still not penetrated the consciousness of the average user. So when the price of gas shot up, no one thought about putting a price tag on water.

WITHOUT AGRICULTURAL REFORM, A WATER SHORTAGE IS INEVITABLE

A mere 10 kilometers from the capital the landscape becomes unfamiliar to the Ukrainian eye: here mountains and fields blend into one orange, yellow, and brown mass. There is not a trace of anything similar to the green Ukrainian Carpathians or chornozem , our black earth. You realize that it takes water to grow anything in this region, and it has to be supplied on a daily basis because of the heat.

Gaib Bastramovich, a petroleum geologist and member of the Aral-88 expedition, which brought the Aral Sea tragedy to the public’s attention, toldThe Day: “They are merciless with water. Central Asia has enough water. They use an average of 15,000 to 20,000 cubic meters of water per hectare, while an optimum harvest requires 7,000 to 9,000 at most. A mere 21 percent of this amount is used efficiently, and the remaining 79 percent is lost, mainly through canals that run through farms and between them.”

Bastramovich, a lively, active man close to 80 years old, can go on for hours talking about solutions to the water problem. But his advice, and that of other researchers, falls on deaf ears, although what he proposes is right on the mark: raise the intellectual level of agricultural workers (in the last 30 years Turkmen agricultural institutions have not offered labs) and make people pay for water.

An agricultural crisis is already brewing here. The pollution of water sources and wasteful use of water in agriculture has led to saline soils and decreased harvest yields. The problem is aggravated by the rapid increase in water consumption by the growing population, while water resources have stayed at the same level.

The effective use of land, a burning issue in both Ukraine and Central Asia, is the subject of lively debates among researchers and members of village associations. Not so long ago the peasants were working on collective farms, and today they have set up their own small enterprises. Together they have to make decisions on water distribution and timely water supply to avoid harvest losses.

Timur Berkeliev, a noted environmentalist in Central Asia, also warns of the approaching crisis: “We can go on like this for seven or eight more years. Turkmenistan uses the greatest amount of water in the world-5,000 cubic meters per capita annually. We have reached the limits of our growth and have to do something if we don’t want 80 percent of the population to sink below the poverty level. All the countries of Central Asia are slowly moving along the path of agricultural reforms. Agriculture is now being subsidized by villagers, who work more than they earn. If people also have to pay for water, many will leave their villages.”

There is only one way out, and that is to change the culture of agriculture rather than cultivate new lands and cause existing areas to turn saline. By 1960 there were four million hectares of irrigated land in Central Asia, including Southern Kazakhstan. Today this figure has risen to nine million. This is the main cause behind the drying of the Aral Sea. Since 1980 harvest yields have been declining because of the salinity of the land. Today the cotton harvest is 30 percent of the optimal level.

Uzbek expert Yusup Kamalov claims that “the crisis in agriculture is caused by the inertness of the system, the absence of private ownership of lands, the lack of a water supply market (as a consumption regulator), and a state monopoly on cotton, which freezes the price for manufacturers and then sells cotton at five times the procurement price.”

INTERGOVERNMENTAL AGREEMENTS, OR WHY THE COUNTRIES OF CENTRAL ASIA HAVE A HARD TIME UNDERSTANDING EACH OTHER

The breakup of the Soviet Union also destroyed the system of using the resources of other countries. Today there is no longer any common water, oil, and gas supply system. The water issue has grown particularly acute, forcing the countries of Central Asia to sit down at the negotiating table and engage in water diplomacy. So far they have not been able to reach an agreement on direct payment for water resources, and they are using the barter system: gas for water (Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan) and water for electricity (Tajikistan and Kazakhstan).

Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan are experiencing the consequences of the irrational planned economy. These countries are located in the basins of two main Asian rivers, the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya, the first of which drains into the Aral Sea. The more northerly countries (Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Kazakhstan) are rich in oil, gas, and other resources, but for water they depend on the more southerly, poor, countries: Tajikistan and Kyrzystan’s share of surface water drainage is nearly 85 percent. It should be noted that 96 percent of the runoff of the Amu Darya has been regulated, and 85 percent of the Syr Darya.

The dependence of these countries on the two main rivers in the region, which flow from the Pamir and Tien Shan Mountains, is placing new tasks before their leaders. The 1993 Agreement on Cooperation in the Joint Management, Use, and Protection of Water Resources of Inter-State Sources was unable to eradicate the conflicts around water. Several more documents were subsequently adopted, but they were equally ineffective in settling the issue. As a result, there are tensions between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, Kyrgystan and Tajikistan, and Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan over the utilization of water resources, say UN environmental experts, who have prepared a special report on Central Asia as part of the Environment and Security Initiative.

In the late 1980s scientists noted that the runoff of the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya was being used up entirely. This was the cause of the Aral Sea catastrophe. It is unlikely that the sea can be restored, with the exception of the Little Aral Sea in Kazakhstan. However, the fate of the Aral Sea should serve as a warning against hasty and ill-conceived solutions to water problems.

The drying of the Aral Sea, which once played an important role in softening the cold northern winds in autumn and winter and reducing the summer heat, has affected the region’s climate: the winter of 2007-08 was the coldest one in the last century, with temperatures of 20-30 degrees below zero, something Turkmen had never seen before.

The solution of the water problems is crucial to the stability of Central Asia. The international community of countries that consume oil from this region does not want any conflicts, and it is ready to go to great lengths to help resolve the water dilemma.

However, this is not something that is easily done in closed, authoritarian countries, which view international aid projects with apprehension. For example, the UN experts who arrived from various countries to study water supply problems and develop solutions were not permitted to go beyond the city of Ashgabat by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

In principle, Central Asia could resolve some of its problems without the international community’s assistance. An old Turkmen expression is “isril kharam,” which means “no waste.” This principle used to be instilled in people from early childhood, so that they would treat nature with care. But the USSR imposed a different attitude to nature’s gifts. That is why the new generation finds it so hard to withstand the onslaught and temptations of the consumer culture.