BAKU, Azerbaijan, April 22. Leaders of regional
countries are arriving in Astana, where the Regional Ecological
Summit and the meeting of the Council of Heads of States-founders
of the International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea (IFAS), are
scheduled to begin on April 22.

While global actors continue to debate climate finance, Central
Asian states are demonstrating that coordinated regional action can
have a direct impact on economic outcomes.

Despite differing priorities in water and energy management,
Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan
are steadily strengthening IFAS — a mechanism established in
January 1993 in Tashkent — which has already attracted over $8.5
billion in national and donor funding for water and environmental
projects. In this context, effective water resource management is
closely associated with the GDP performance of each republic.

As Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan, Alibek
Bakayev noted during a recent panel discussion at the
Antalya Diplomacy Forum, cooperation in the water and energy sector
remains a key priority for Central Asia.

He emphasized the importance of continuing close cooperation in
this field, making full use of existing platforms, including the
International Fund for Saving the Aral Sea.

The financial model of IFAS today is of a hybrid nature.
National budgets act as an anchor, and international grants and
loans act as a lever for the implementation of large-scale
projects, such as RESILAND CA+. The more coordinated the countries
work within the fund, the cheaper access to global financial
markets becomes for the region’s environmental and infrastructure
projects.

Over three decades, the fund has progressed from the first Aral
Sea basin programs to real economic results. Recent summits have
consistently strengthened the focus on institutional reform and
attracting investment. Preparations for this year’s meeting
confirmed this course. In the period from March through April, the
IFAS Board adopted five decisions on improving the structure,
digitizing water accounting in the Syr Darya and Amu Darya basins,
developing a Framework Convention on Water Use, and the idea of
declaring 2026–2036 the “Decade of Practical Actions.”

The most noticeable economic effect is the restoration of the
North (Small) Aral Sea. Thanks to the Kokaral Dam and interstate
coordination of the Syr Darya flow, the water volume increased from
18.9 billion cubic meters in 2022 to 23 billion by the end of 2025
– the inflow exceeded 6 billion cubic meters. The second phase of
the project (2026–2029), with World Bank support, provides for the
reconstruction of the dam, raising the level to 44 meters, and
increasing the volume to 34 billion cubic meters and the area to
3913 km². Irrigation modernization on 143,000 hectares has already
saved about 500 million cubic meters of water, which can be
directed to further development.

This directly impacts the Aral Sea region’s economy. The
decrease in salinity has brought back 20 species of fish that had
previously disappeared. The catch has grown to 8,000 tons per year,
and 10 fish processing plants are in operation, four of which have
European certification. Fish are exported to 13 countries,
including the EU, China, and Russia. Thousands of jobs have been
created, and the outflow of the population has decreased. In
Uzbekistan, large-scale afforestation of the dried seabed (the goal
is more than 70% by 2030) fixes the sand, reduces dust storms, and
opens up opportunities for sustainable agriculture and new
projects.

Central Asian countries are uniting for a single pragmatic goal
– to turn a transboundary environmental threat into a common
economic driver. The new meeting, the reform of IFAS, the
digitalization of monitoring, and the launch of new programs could
attract additional investments from the World Bank, the EU, the
Asian Development Bank, and other donors.

Saving the Aral Sea has ceased to be solely an environmental
task, becoming a powerful tool for Central Asian economic
integration.