XV MEETING OF THE ARAL-SYRDARYA BASIN COUNSIL
At the invitation of Kazakh party, SIC ICWC Director Prof.Victor Dukhovniy participated in the meeting of the Aral-Syrdarya Basin Council held on July 15, 2016.
The meeting was chaired by Adylkhan Karlykhanov, Head of the Aral-Syrdarya Basin Inspectorate. The meeting reviewed the process of growing season and noted that, in spite of apparent abundance of water, some sites of the Aral-Syrdarya Basin experience severe water deficit. First of all, this concerns the “Dustlik” canal. The participants underscored the necessity of coordination of operation of the Chardarya reservoir with its compensating reservoir – the Koksaray reservoir, in particular, in the light of unstable regime of water releases from the upstream reservoirs – Toktogul, Bakhri Tochik (of the Kairakkum reservoir) and Charvak. The participants also complained about insufficient cooperation between BWO “Syrdarya” and the Aral-Syrdarya Basin Inspectorate and Council.
During the meeting, Amirkhan Kenshimov, Deputy Head of IFAS branch in Kazakhstan, noted that the quality of water is not considered when allocating water along the Syrdarya River. In particular, wastewaters from chemical enterprises in the Chirchik River were mentioned, as well as untreated uranium wastes from determined small rivers in the Fergana valley (Mali Su). The Basin Water Inspectorate takes measures to supply settlements with water, as well as villages through the system of main conduits. Although 1 m3 of supplied water is US $ 1 along the group conduits, at this level water users pay at about 15% of this price, while the rest amount is covered through subsidies.
In his speech, Prof.Dukhovniy underlined the role of the Basin Councils in modern water management and necessity of a wider use of French model that provides not only monitoring functions of the activity of water management bodies, but also actively involves financial resources for strengthening the capacity of the Basin Administrations. The level of basin management should be improved through implementation of the SCADA system.
|