AILSA CHANG, HOST:
The Aral Sea straddles the border of the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. It was once one of the world's largest lakes, but after years of being drained to irrigate crops, it shriveled and nearly disappeared. In a last-ditch effort, Kazakhstan tried to stop the rapid drain of the sea's dwindling waters by building a massive dam. NPR's Above the Fray fellow, Valerie Kipnis, reports from the shores of the Aral Sea in Kazakhstan.
VALERIE KIPNIS, BYLINE: The village of Tastubek was nearly desolate for 30 years. Omirserik Ibragimov grew up without knowing the sea. He only heard about it in his father's stories.
OMIRSERIK IBRAGIMOV: (Through interpreter) I was born in 1993, and when I was born, the sea was already gone.
KIPNIS: As a boy, Ibragimov played in abandoned boats scattered along a dried-up sea bed. When the dam was built, Ibragimov was 10, and as the water returned, his father taught him how to fish.
IBRAGIMOV: (Through interpreter) So in one, two years after building the dam, the water salinity dropped down.
KIPNIS: These days, Ibragimov is one of dozens of fishermen in Tastubek, able to make a living off fishing in what's come to be known, since it split in two, as the Northern Aral Sea.
(SOUNDBITE OF BOAT ENGINE)
KIPNIS: Out on the blue water, it's hard to imagine the sea was ever at risk of drying up. Wearing thick rubber gloves, fishermen grab breams, asp and catfish out of fishing nets bobbing in the salty water. They say they can make a decent living now, but worry about how long this will all last.
IBRAGIMOV: (Through interpreter) In the last two years, the sea receded about 200 meters from the coastline. It's becoming lower and lower, and I think that it's the main reason why we have less fish now in the Aral Sea, because there is less water.
KIPNIS: There are a number of reasons for this, the most obvious being that the dam that contains the Northern Aral Sea is too low, so water spills over it and evaporates.
(SOUNDBITE OF RUNNING WATER)
KIPNIS: And then there's the river, the Syr Darya, one of two rivers which feeds the Aral Sea. Medieval Islamic texts refer to it as one of the four rivers of paradise. There are songs and stories written about it, but over the years, its levels have been slowly dropping.
(SOUNDBITE OF CAR DRIVING)
KIPNIS: An eight-hour drive through rice plantations upstream and you can see why. We arrive in the city of Kyzylorda. It's in the region closest to the Aral Sea, and it produces nearly all of the country's rice, a food staple in Kazakhstan.
So we are currently at where the Syr Darya river enters the region of Kyzylorda, and it goes through this sort of dam-like structure that holds back some of it and diverts the rest to go towards these canals that are - it's going to feed the rice plantations. And what's left for the actual river to flow to the Aral Sea, it's minimal.
In some parts, the river levels are so low that small islands of sand appear in the middle. And it's not all the rice industry to blame. It's the way that water is managed and used that's inefficient.
BOLAT BEKNIYAZ: (Through interpreter) A lot of water is lost in the infrastructure, the big, long irrigation canals. Some of them are not lined. Some are earthen.
KIPNIS: Bolat Bekniyaz is the vice minister of water resources and irrigation for all of Kazakhstan. He's dedicated his life to studying the Aral Sea.
BEKNIYAZ: (Through interpreter) In the near future, we will gradually reduce water consumption.
KIPNIS: But the situation is urgent. The shrinking of the Aral Sea has itself changed the regional climate.
BEKNIYAZ: (Through interpreter) If we don't adapt, we can lose both rivers, so we must adapt. We must.
(SOUNDBITE OF BOAT ENGINE)
KIPNIS: Nowhere is this urgency to adapt felt more than the fishing village of Tastubek, right at the end of the river's course. As Ibragimov pulls out his daily catch, he says his only dream now is for the sea to be restored for good.
IBRAGIMOV: (Through interpreter) If it will continue shrinking or there will be less water or salty and if you lose the fish in the Aral Sea, that will be the biggest problem, tragedy for the villagers.
KIPNIS: For the villagers, the farmers, the people of Kazakhstan and the hopes of fighting climate change in the region.
For NPR News, this is Valerie Kipnis reporting from Uralsk in Kazakhstan.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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