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Decrease of saline lakes, which comprise 44% of all available lake water, is a major concern. It additionally accelerates the desertification process of the region. Thus, various countries have taken different actions in protecting their lake water levels. The aim of this paper is to assess different strategies directed to tackle the decreased lake water levels in Lake Urmia and the Aral Sea, which split into the North Aral Sea and South Aral Sea. These are among the world’s largest and fastest drying saline lakes observed in the past 50 years and have both reduced to 10% of their original size. The paper presents a thorough review of academic reports, official documents, and databases. Although the dry-up of a lake is a natural process, it has been sped up by human interventions in the hydrological cycle. Dust storms (strong winds) cause problems in the surroundings. In the case of the Aral Sea, they transmit the pollutants from the dry lake bed causing severe health issues. Various strategies were implemented to manage the socio-economic conditions caused due to the drying of lakes. The strategy implemented for the North Aral Sea was to restore the lake by reducing the water withdrawals from the Syr Darya river, which lead to increased water inflow to the sea. The suggested strategy for Lake Urmia was to restore the lake by water transfer activities from various water sources. These projects have not yet been realized. The strategy implemented for the South Aral Sea was to use a dry lake bed to diversify the economy by oil and mineral extraction along with developing a tourist industry based on the considerable interest to come and observe an ecological disaster of such monumental proportions. These findings show that there is no common best solution for this type of problem. The best fit depends on the local context and it is strongly path-dependent.
Kamshat Tussupova; Anchita Anchita; Peder Hjorth; Mojtaba Moravej. Drying Lakes: A Review on the Applied Restoration Strategies and Health Conditions in Contiguous Areas. Water 2020, 12, 749 .
AMA StyleKamshat Tussupova, Anchita Anchita, Peder Hjorth, Mojtaba Moravej. Drying Lakes: A Review on the Applied Restoration Strategies and Health Conditions in Contiguous Areas. Water. 2020; 12 (3):749.
Chicago/Turabian StyleKamshat Tussupova; Anchita Anchita; Peder Hjorth; Mojtaba Moravej. 2020. "Drying Lakes: A Review on the Applied Restoration Strategies and Health Conditions in Contiguous Areas." Water 12, no. 3: 749.
Rural water supplies have traditionally been overshadowed by urban ones. That must now change, as the Sustainable Development Goals calls for water for all. The objective of the paper is to assess the current access to and the perceived water quality in villages with various types of water supply. The survey was carried out during July–December 2017 in four villages in central Kazakhstan. Overall, 1369 randomly selected households were interviewed. The results revealed that even though villagers were provided with tap water, significant numbers used alternative sources. There were three reasons for this situation: residents’ doubts regarding the tap water quality; use of other sources out of habit; and availability of cheaper or free sources. Another problem concerned the volume of water consumption, which dropped sharply with decreased quality or inconvenience of sources used by households. Moreover, people gave a poor estimate to the quality and reliability of water from wells, open sources and tankered water. The paper suggests that as well decentralization of water management as monitoring of both water supply and water use are essential measures. There must be a tailor-made approach to each village for achieving the Sustainable Development Goal of providing rural Kazakhstan with safe water.
Alua Omarova; Kamshat Tussupova; Peder Hjorth; Marat Kalishev; Raushan Dosmagambetova. Water Supply Challenges in Rural Areas: A Case Study from Central Kazakhstan. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 2019, 16, 688 .
AMA StyleAlua Omarova, Kamshat Tussupova, Peder Hjorth, Marat Kalishev, Raushan Dosmagambetova. Water Supply Challenges in Rural Areas: A Case Study from Central Kazakhstan. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2019; 16 (5):688.
Chicago/Turabian StyleAlua Omarova; Kamshat Tussupova; Peder Hjorth; Marat Kalishev; Raushan Dosmagambetova. 2019. "Water Supply Challenges in Rural Areas: A Case Study from Central Kazakhstan." International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 16, no. 5: 688.
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) require nations to ensure adequate water supply for all. For Kazakhstan, this means that rural areas will need much stronger attention as they have been rather neglected in efforts to comply with the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). This study aims to establish a baseline data concerning the current situation in villages that will need interventions according to the SDGs. The study was performed by means of questionnaires. The results should be seen as initial guidelines that can help to illuminate some of the uncounted challenges in future efforts to meet the SDG targets. As hardly any information exists about sanitation in rural Kazakhstan, the study essentially focuses on water services. The results show that 65% of rural dwellers want to connect and pay for the piped water supply. At the same time, about 80% have toilets outside their home. Consequently, the water program aiming at providing 80% of rural people with access to tap water from a centralized piped system will not be possible. However, by carefully managing the existing water supply and sanitation system in joint collaboration with the local users, significant progress can be made. The present results show the important first steps that need to be taken in this direction.
Kamshat Tussupova; Peder Hjorth; Ronny Berndtsson. Access to Drinking Water and Sanitation in Rural Kazakhstan. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 2016, 13, 1115 .
AMA StyleKamshat Tussupova, Peder Hjorth, Ronny Berndtsson. Access to Drinking Water and Sanitation in Rural Kazakhstan. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. 2016; 13 (11):1115.
Chicago/Turabian StyleKamshat Tussupova; Peder Hjorth; Ronny Berndtsson. 2016. "Access to Drinking Water and Sanitation in Rural Kazakhstan." International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 13, no. 11: 1115.
The water sector has experienced numerous failures in projects aiming at sustainable development and has seen some, but less numerous, examples of successes. However, the most striking observation is the near universal failure to learn from these examples. Somehow, scientists and managers have allowed the indications of new approaches and opportunities go undetected because they did not fit with their mindsets or perceptual apparatus.We discuss some of the mental frames that have hampered the progress towards sustainable development by creating confusion and inconsistency in the interpretation of sustainable development concepts. We analyze where these frames come from, who is promoting or defending them, and what can be done to change these frames in ways that are more in line with the basic tenets of sustainable development. We conclude that most sustainability initiatives have failed because the environment and development were not properly brought together. The “environment” is where we live and “development” is what we all do in attempting to improve our lot within that abode. The two are unseparable (Our Common Future). Thus, there is a need to draw on diverse disciplinary perspectives and to cut across sectoral boundaries to counter the monovalent approaches that have dominated mainstream enquiry and practice. To that end, we discuss how systems analysis can help produce adequate mental models and enabling frameworks for process changes. These frameworks should define general objectives and means of verification of progress without specifying uniform approaches and activities. Systems analysis is also a methodology that can help make sure that problems posed are adequately defined and dismiss biased goal formulations stemming from twisted frames imposed by dominant actors or “solution-oriented approaches.
Peder Hjorth; Kaveh Madani. Systems Analysis to Promote Frames and Mental Models for Sustainable Water Management. Proceedings of The 3rd World Sustainability Forum 2013, 1 .
AMA StylePeder Hjorth, Kaveh Madani. Systems Analysis to Promote Frames and Mental Models for Sustainable Water Management. Proceedings of The 3rd World Sustainability Forum. 2013; ():1.
Chicago/Turabian StylePeder Hjorth; Kaveh Madani. 2013. "Systems Analysis to Promote Frames and Mental Models for Sustainable Water Management." Proceedings of The 3rd World Sustainability Forum , no. : 1.
15 m or higher A crest length of not less than 500 m A spillway discharge potential of at least 2,000 m3/s A reservoir volume 15,000,000 m3 or more (Source: McCully, 1996) Precipitation is not evenly distributed over a region in either density or seasonality. For more than 5,000 years water-retaining structures have been built in different parts of the world to ensure that water is available for domestic and agricultural purposes throughout the year (Biswas and Tortajada, 2001). Some 6,000 years ago, the Mioris reservoir, with an area of 2,000 km2 and a volume of 12 km3, was constructed in the Nile Valley. Herodotus regarded it as one of the Seven Wonders of the World (Avakyan and Ovchinnikova, 1971). According to the ICOLD ...
Peder Hjorth; Lars Bengtsson. Large Dams, Statistics and Critical Review. Encyclopedia of Solid Earth Geophysics 2012, 475 -479.
AMA StylePeder Hjorth, Lars Bengtsson. Large Dams, Statistics and Critical Review. Encyclopedia of Solid Earth Geophysics. 2012; ():475-479.
Chicago/Turabian StylePeder Hjorth; Lars Bengtsson. 2012. "Large Dams, Statistics and Critical Review." Encyclopedia of Solid Earth Geophysics , no. : 475-479.
Rainfall is the most variable component of the hydrological cycle. Oftentimes, rainfall does not occur when it or where it is needed. The construction of a dam creates a reservoir where water can be stored during wet periods and saved until it is needed during dry spells. If reservoirs are connected to form a network, they can be used to overcome some of the problems caused by the spatial variability of rainfall. The first dams were constructed some 5,000 years ago, on the Euphrates and Tigris rivers in Mesopotamia and on the Nile in Egypt. The pace of dam construction was, however, not very fast. According to the International Committee on Large Dams (ICOLD), there were less than 500 dam at the end of the nineteenth century. Of them less than 10 could be classified as large dams. Postel (1993) claims that it was not until two centuries ago that the science of irrigation, grounded in the principles of hydraulics, took root. In 1800, an estimated eight million hect ...
Peder Hjorth. Large Dams and Environment. Encyclopedia of Solid Earth Geophysics 2012, 472 -475.
AMA StylePeder Hjorth. Large Dams and Environment. Encyclopedia of Solid Earth Geophysics. 2012; ():472-475.
Chicago/Turabian StylePeder Hjorth. 2012. "Large Dams and Environment." Encyclopedia of Solid Earth Geophysics , no. : 472-475.
The Mar del Plata International Water Conference provided the first global assessment of the water sector. It was found that in most developing countries the state of water supply and sanitation services were deplorable. Consequently, a call for concerted action to improve coverage and efficiency of the water supply and sanitation sector was launched. This call resulted in the International Water Supply and Sanitation Decade (1981–1990). The Decade provided important lessons concerning effective methodologies to improve the state of the WSS sector. The paper discusses why the poor state of the water supply and sanitation conditions still tend to be the greatest development failure during the 20th century. The recipe for success was there, and the money was there. So, why were governments and big donors like the World Bank refusing to apply the lessons from the Decade? The basic conditions for success are spelled out, and some successful cases are used to illustrate these. The conclusion is that change is possible but that civil society organizations have to be empowered to make governments "feel the heat" and spend more money on water and sanitation, and to spend it more wisely.
Peder Hjorth. Towards Sustainable Urban Water and Sanitation Services: Barriers and Bridges. Sustainability 2009, 1, 1023 -1034.
AMA StylePeder Hjorth. Towards Sustainable Urban Water and Sanitation Services: Barriers and Bridges. Sustainability. 2009; 1 (4):1023-1034.
Chicago/Turabian StylePeder Hjorth. 2009. "Towards Sustainable Urban Water and Sanitation Services: Barriers and Bridges." Sustainability 1, no. 4: 1023-1034.
Peder Hjorth. From insight to action in reservoir management-lessons from Asia. Natural Resources Forum 2001, 25, 313 -320.
AMA StylePeder Hjorth. From insight to action in reservoir management-lessons from Asia. Natural Resources Forum. 2001; 25 (4):313-320.
Chicago/Turabian StylePeder Hjorth. 2001. "From insight to action in reservoir management-lessons from Asia." Natural Resources Forum 25, no. 4: 313-320.