As Iran war stokes water security fears, Central Asia could turn to China
Nations facing chronic water shortages might look to Chinese investment to upgrade their creaking Soviet-era infrastructure, observers say
It has also exposed the vulnerability of the world’s most indispensable resource: water.
These risks could also resonate in neighbouring Central Asia, where governments grappling with worsening water shortages might look to China for help in modernising their irrigation systems and managing shared rivers, observers said.
Unlike Persian Gulf countries, which rely on desalination, landlocked Central Asia depends largely on glacier-fed rivers originating in the Tian Shan mountains shared with China.
Central Asia’s water supplies are chronically strained due to “the same factors that have plagued Iran’s water supply long before the onset of hostilities”, according to Oleg Abdurashitov, chief policy adviser at Dubai-based independent public affairs consultancy Outpost Eurasia. These include climate change, population growth and increasing urbanisation.