Kazakhstan, Astana, Sept. 5 / Trend A.Maratov /
The time has come for the Central Asia to develop and adopt a single convention on the problem of melting glaciers, Kazakh Environment Minister Nurgali Ashim said at the lobby of the regional meeting of the Central Asian National Commissions of UNESCO in Astana on Monday.
He said today's acute problem is the preserving fresh water in the Central Asian region.
"If earlier the Aral Sea received 50 cubic meters of water per year, now the figure is "zero" from the Amu Darya and only six cubic meters from the Syr Darya," he underscored.
The issue of distribution of the water resources is extremely urgent in the Central Asian region. The large volume of water resources in Central Asia forms on the territory of Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, and then goes to Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. As a result, the lack of water affects the countries located downstream.
Just Kazakhstan invested $1 billion in saving the Syr Darya, Ashim said. He negatively assessed some regional countries' initiative on the construction of hydroelectric power plants (HPP) on them.
Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan lack enough electricity. Due to the inability to generate it by the Thermal Power Plants (TPP) due to lack of raw materials, these countries need to build more hydropower plants.
"It can not be done as an environmental catastrophe is imminent. Aral Sea dries up, its salt is spread and deposited on the glaciers," Ashim said.
Ashima has supported the initiative of creating the world's first Center for the Study of melting glaciers.
Kazakhstan offered the Central Asian countries to establish a world Center for the Study of melting glaciers in Almaty, Chairman of the Kazakhstan National Commission for UNESCO and ISESCO Imangali Tasmagambetov said at the event.
Today's regional meeting became the first event uniting representatives of National Commissions of Central Asia to create dialogue and to discuss issues pertaining to the regional cooperation within the sphere.
The event will adopt recommendations with a view to advance the country and regional initiatives within the organization.