The Other 90%: Loss of Riparian Forest in the Aral Sea Region of Uzbekistan

• In Event: Environmentalists, Spies, and Scientists: Remote Sensing in and of Eurasia I

Abstract

The shrinking of the Aral Sea is synonymous with environmental catastrophe because of the loss of 90% of the sea from the 1960s to present. However, this is not the only devastating loss caused by the reduced flows of the great rivers of Central Asia: the Syr Daryo and Amu Daryo. An estimated 90% of the tugai, the riparian forest which covered the Amu Daryo delta, shading the canals and wetlands and providing habitat to a range of animals and plants including the Caspian Tiger, has also been lost over this period. Developing a feminist approach to remote sensing, this paper intertwines results from object-based supervised classification of Landsat satellite data from 1984 to present with ethnographic data to visualize and quantify this changing landscape and probe the impacts for the human and more-than-human residents of the Amu Daryo delta. I argue that the focus on saving the Aral Sea generated in part through dramatic sequences of Landsat imagery showing its desiccation has come at the expense of maintaining and restoring other ecosystems that have had similar rates of decline, but that are far less spectacular and visible in the view from above. I conclude by proposing policy alternatives to restore this essential ecosystem.

Author

• Kate F Shields, Rhodes College