The Aral Sea Disaster Essay example -- Policies Environment Essays

The Aral Sea Disaster Abstract The Aral Sea and the entire Aral Sea basin area have achieved worldwide notoriety due to the environmental disaster. The example of the Aral Sea disaster has sent a signal to the entire international community demonstrating how fast and irrevocable the environmental system can be ruined if there is no long-term thinking and planning in place. This paper gives a broad overview of the policies that have resulted in dying of the forth-largest inland body of water. It concentrates on the policies and approaches of the international organizations towards the problem, describes examples of the projects and presents a conclusion on effectiveness of such policies. Introduction The Aral sea used to be the forth largest inland body of water. It had a fishing industry that employed 60,000 people and it attracted thousands of tourists. Today the Aral Sea is biologically dead and has shrunk by approximately 75-80% in volume and 50-60% in area. (See Attachment 1. The chronology of the desiccation of the Aral Sea). Fishing towns such as Muinak are now 60 kilometers inland. Approximately 75 million tons per year of toxic salt from the exposed seabed are blown over thousands of kilometers of inhabited land increasing the already high level of salinity and worsening the environmental situation. Where is the Aral Sea located? The Aral Sea is in the very heart of the Central Asia. Central Asia, an area of 1.7 millions km2 in total, lies in the middle of the Eurasian continent. It is at the crossroads of the old caravan routes that ran from Europe to Asia and the Middle East to the Far East. The whole region consists of vast deserts and semi-arid lands (See Attachment 2. Geographical ... .../aralsea/asa_dis.htm Operational Research http://www.msf.org/aralsea/op_res.htm Tuberculosis Pilot Program http://msf.org/aralsea/tb_pilot.htm 3. UNOPS web site http://unops.org/5 proin/5pi2001.html 4. International Aral Sea Rehabilitation Fund web site http://ifas-almaty.kz/ENG/Consequesnces.html 5. Soros Foundation ¡Ã‚ ¦s Office in Tashkent web site www.soros.org 6. German Remote Data Center Geographical location of the Aral Sea http://www.dfd.dlr.de/app/land/aralsee/aralregion.html Chronology of the desiccation of the Aral Sea http://www.dfd.dlf.de/app/land/aralsee/chronology.html Picture 1. Chronology of the dessication of the Aral Sea The series of images were derived by satellite remote sensing data and conventional data (WDB II for the mask of 1960, bathymetry for the year of 2010).