WGA/4/12
Sponsored by Varun Kilaru, Abduazim Rakhmanov, Samuel Michael, Satya Peddibhotla of Ravenwood High School
The delegates above represented the Delegation of Uzbekistan.
This legislation was filed in the Social, Humanitarian and Cultural category
Presented as part of the MUN B 2023 conference
| 1 | To the General Assembly: |
| 2 | |
| 3 | Aware that in the last 50 years the Aral Sea has shrunk by 90 percent of its volume, |
| 4 | |
| 5 | Recognizing that the Aral Sea was once the 4th largest freshwater lake in the world, |
| 6 | |
| 7 | Concerned by the connection between the shrinkage of the Aral Sea to severe environmental |
| 8 | impacts, such as a devastating 80 percent loss in biodiversity of aquatic wildlife due to the rising |
| 9 | salinity levels, to a drastic decrease in cotton production due to a lack of nutrients in the soil which |
| 10 | forces not only fields but even the farmers to be overworked, and to major climate impacts in |
| 11 | which the warm seasons have gotten longer and more bitter, whilst the winter has become shorter |
| 12 | and unbearable; |
| 13 | |
| 14 | Acknowledging that the shrinkage of the Aral Sea has directly affected over 3.5 million people |
| 15 | living around it, and has caused an increase in the rates of diseases such as anemia, tuberculosis, |
| 16 | kidney/liver diseases, respiratory infections, allergies, and cancer, which are spread by dust |
| 17 | storms as a result of the exposed bottom of the sea that contains a dry salt crust and numerous |
| 18 | pollutants; |
| 19 | |
| 20 | Alarmed by the deterioration of water quality due to the over 150,000 tons of toxic chemicals |
| 21 | released in the Aral Sea over the last 10 years and the pollution created from fertilizers and |
| 22 | pesticides, which have played a significant role in the high rate of anemia found in almost all |
| 23 | groups of women in regions near the Aral Sea, and the increase of male infertility from 30-40% in |
| 24 | the 1980s to 65% in the late 1990s; |
| 25 | |
| 26 | Taking into account that the shrinkage of the Aral Sea was caused by the building of irrigation |
| 27 | canals along the Amu Darya and Syr Darya rivers to irrigate cotton plantations by the Soviet |
| 28 | Union, who unscrupulously devised this system in an attempt to monopolize the water and gain |
| 29 | control of it for themselves, this has caused the South Aral Sea to only receive 5% of the water |
| 30 | exported from the Amu Darya and the Syr Darya rivers; |
| 31 | |
| 32 | Considering that there are over 3000 kilometers of irrigation canals branching the Amu Darya |
| 33 | River, in which over 90% of the water from the Amu Darya River is diverted into, of which only |
| 34 | 12% have been water-proofed; over 40-75% of the water in these canals are lost annually due to |
| 35 | evaporation, leakage, poor maintenance, and poor irrigation practices; |