DUSHANBE, October 17, Asia-Plus — Yarash Poulodov, Director General of the Research Institute for Water Engineering and Land Reclamation of the Ministry of Water Resources and Land Reclamation (MWRLR), told a news conference in Dushanbe on October 16 that it is necessary to elaborate an economic model of water consumption for Central Asia.
According to him, they are currently projecting a new agreement on water consumption among five states of the region.
“Models of regulation and distribution of water resources that had been elaborated in the Soviet time already have become obsolete and we now should admit that that water is an article of commerce and it has its price even though this figure now is equal to zero,” Poulodov said., expressing confidence that a market of water will be established in future.
“Our main intention is to determine an economic mechanism of water consumption, which would be based on mutually beneficial and mutually acceptable conditions,”
Commenting on a recent statement made by Uzbek Foreign Minister Vladimir Norov at the recent session of the UN General Assembly about water consumption problems in the Central Asian region, Poulodov supposed that speaking about ecological problems “Uzbek minister had apparently meant the economic problems.”
According to Poulodov, 90 percent of 116 cubic kilometers of water in the region is used by the countries located in the lower reaches of rivers in Central Asia.
Thus, Tajikistan, which located in the upper reaches of the Amudarya River, now uses only 11.9 percent of water, while Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, which are located in the lower upper of the river, use more than 42 percent each, the expert said.
Homid Orifov, an official with the Ministry of Energy and Industries (MoEI), speaking to journalists noted that “natural irrigation resources of the Syrdarya River were actually used last century already.” “That is why the countries began constructing dams in order have an opportunity to regulate the water consumption process,” said Orifov, “In exchange for this, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan in the Soviet time had been receiving compensations in form of fuel oil, coal and so forth.”
“After collapse of the Soviet Union, this system was broken, and we now give them water free of charge, having nothing in return for water,” the MoEI official said.
“Solution to this problem is in norms of international law, which is based on two principles: not causing damage and fair use of water-and-energy resources,” said Orifov, “Our neighbors are speaking only about the first principle, forgetting the second one.”
