The Aral Sea, once the fourth-largest lake in the world, has now nearly disappeared, losing over 90 percent of its surface area since the 1960s, leaving behind mostly desert.
The water that is left has become highly salinated and polluted, which has caused ecological devastation. In 2010, then UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon flew over it on a helicopter and, in a state of shock, admitted the experience left him “with a profound impression, one of sadness that such a mighty sea has disappeared,” News.Az reports citing foreign media.
The lake is situated on the border between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. In the 1960s, when both nations were part of the Soviet Bloc, officials launched a plan to cultivate vast stretches of barren land in Central Asia by redirecting water from the two main rivers that fed the Aral Sea: the Syr Darya and Amu Darya. No one managed to foresee the devastating effects that would ensue.
Without water from the Amu Darya and Syr Darya, the lake dried up. For decades, the lakebed accumulated toxic pesticides and fertilizers washed down from the cotton fields.
While there have been various attempts to restore the sea over the last 34 years, neither country has achieved a significant breakthrough. In 2005, Kazakhstan completed the Dike Kokaral Dam, which trapped water in its part of the lake and somewhat revived commercial fishing in the northwestern part of the sea, though the total lake volume continues to drop. Uzbekistan has not had any success in addressing the desertification, soil erosion, and sand/salt storms brought by the disaster.
As one industry analysis report from the China Report Network (中国报告网) noted:
- It saves water, saves labor, increases yield, saves energy, has the best irrigation effect, and has strong adaptability to terrain.
The cost of “white gold”
The Aral Sea disaster is tightly linked to Uzbekistan’s cultivation of cotton, or “white gold” as it is sometimes called. The Soviet Union’s agricultural plans turned the country into a giant cotton plantation with an annual production of 4.5 million tons, which accounted for more than 30 percent of the bloc’s total cotton output.
The loss of such a colossal body of water significantly affected the climate, manifesting in unbearably hot summers and harsh frosts in winter. The residents of the Aral Sea region were hit hardest. In the late 1990s, the child mortality rate in the region was the highest in the world, and the situation remains dire.
Every year, storms disperse 80 million tons of toxic sand and salt from the lake bed, which poisons the population, leading to a myriad of chronic and deadly diseases.
Various regional studies found toxic substances, insecticides, and dangerous pesticides in the blood and urine of adults and children, and even in the milk of nursing mothers. Adults and children in the region often suffer from anemia, cancer, kidney disease, and epidemic-spreading tuberculosis.
Drip irrigation and salt-resistant plants
The environmental cooperation on the Aral Sea is just one aspect of the rapidly growing engagement between Uzbekistan and China, which covers energy, mining, car manufacturing, renewable energy, transportation, and agriculture, among others. China is simultaneously Uzbekistan’s largest trade partner and investor. In 2024, the number of Uzbek-Chinese joint enterprises rose by 43.6 percent and reached 3,357, cementing China's role in the region.
In 2016, the two countries made the first step towards jointly addressing the Aral Sea crisis when a group of Chinese scientists visited the region for a study, which lasted more than five years. In 2022, the researchers concluded that the main reasons for the lake’s dessication in the last 20 years were climate change and lack of water-saving technologies on agricultural lands. Farmers utilize water-saving technologies on only five percent of the arable land in Uzbekistan, leaving a massive potential for water-saving technologies.
The hands-on cooperation started in 2020 when the Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography (XIEG) under the Chinese Academy of Sciences started rolling out drip irrigation systems in several locations across Uzbekistan to showcase its efficiency.
Chen Xi, Director of the Research Center for Ecology and Environment of Central Asia under the Chinese Academy of Sciences, shared:
This would be a huge positive development given that no water feeds the Uzbek part of the lake, and the Kazakh side got only 2.6 million cubic meters in 2024.
In parallel to promoting efficient irrigation systems, China has been working on afforestation programs. In 2020, XIEG built a nursery garden on the lake shore, where dozens of salt-tolerant plants were successfully grown, showing their potential for scaling up and reducing the salinity in the soil.
This was followed up on a much larger scale. In 2025, Abdirashit Mirzambetov, Head of the laboratory of biotechnology and plant physiology of the International Innovation Center of the Aral Sea region, shared:
According to the Chinese Academy of Sciences, in early 2025, XIEG shipped 1.5 tons of salt-tolerant plant seeds to Uzbekistan to establish a joint saline plant garden. “These seeds will support land restoration efforts and serve as a foundation for biodiversity research,” Wang Ping from XIEG said.
The latest technological know-how brought by Chinese scientists to the Aral Sea region is solar-powered solutions. In this regard, in 2025, XIEG installed “drip irrigation systems powered by photovoltaic panels” and an “innovative solar-powered smart irrigation system for cotton cultivation.” XIEG states that “the project has tripled cotton yields and significantly reduced production costs and water consumption.”
Green diplomacy
China has touted its efforts in aiding Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan with the shrinking of the Aral Sea. This allows China to brand itself as a high-tech superpower in messaging directed toward Central Asia. Likewise, China can depict itself as ecologically friendly.
At a time when Western powers are increasingly wavering on their international commitments, the Aral sea crisis is also understood as a way for China to solidify ties with Uzbekistan and other central Asian countries, in “upholding the principles of ‘science without borders,’” with the implication that Western countries have abandoned this task or sought to use scientific assistance as a coercive tool.
In assisting Uzbekistan, China draws on its own experiences in fighting desertification and soil erosion. China has created the world’s largest man-made forest in Saihanba, Hebei, as well as sought to transform the desert in Inner Mongolia. It's experience in restoring the Tarim River basin in northeastern China is seen as especially relevant, however, in that conditions there are seen as similar to the Aral Sea.
The Saihan Tower at Saihanba National Forest Park in Hebei, China. This park is the largest man-made park in the world, and is an example of China's reforestation experience. Image from Wikimedia Commons. CC BY-SA 4.0
Given this experience, China has sought to frame itself as an expert in combating desertification as a means to strengthen ties with Uzbekistan and other countries facing issues with soil erosion and desertification.
Ultimately, the success of this cooperation and the overall responsibility to deal with the Aral Sea disaster lay on Uzbekistan’s shoulders as the host nation. China has already emerged as a winner by positioning itself as the leader in this field and a responsible foreign actor willing to engage beyond extracting resources.
Such cooperation helps China improve its public image in Uzbekistan, especially among regular citizens. It will likely take decades to see any improvement in the Aral Sea crisis, but China will be remembered as having lent a helping hand to reverse it.
