Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) – Expeditions to the Aral Sea were held in autumn 2019 and spring 2020 with the support of the UN Development Program.

Expeditions to the drained bottom of the Aral Sea were conducted by the Scientific Information Center of the Interstate Commission for Water Coordination of Central Asia (SIC ICWC) in 2019-2020 within the framework of the Joint Program funded by the UN Multi-Partner Trust Fund for Human Security (MPTHS) for the Aral Sea region in Uzbekistan.

Mitigating the negative consequences of the drying up of the Aral Sea, improving the conditions and quality of life of the population of the region is one of the priority areas of the State Program for the Development of the Aral Sea Region for 2017-2021. To create the basis for the implementation of the program, it is necessary to have a complete understanding of the current state of the ecological disaster zone, the changes taking place there. For this purpose, monitoring of the drained bottom was initiated.

The expeditions took place in two stages with the involvement of representatives of the International Innovation Center for the Aral Sea region under the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan, as well as with the participation of specialists in the field of ecology, soil science, hydrogeology, dendrology, botany and GIS. The total coverage of the study area was 1.2 million hectares, from Chink to the Akpetka Island system, and from the water’s edge to the historical sea level.

The study was carried out within the framework of the UNDP-UNESCO Joint Program "Solving urgent problems of human security in the Aral Sea region by promoting sustainable rural development", funded by the MPTHS in the Aral Sea region. As a result of the expeditions, as part of the project, it is planned to strengthen the institutional infrastructure and technical skills of specialists in the field of afforestation, in particular, the branches of the Forestry Administration and pasture cooperatives in Takhtakupir.