Addressing Water Resources Regulations Policy in Zeravshan River Basin

Abstract

Water resources security and efficient usage is the main source of conflict over transboundary rivers. Zeravshan a transboundary river in Central Asia is a snow-glacier fed river originating in Tajikistan that use only 4% of its resources and further flows to Uzbekistan, who fully utilize river resources for irrigation. Such disparity in river usage causes Tajikistan to consider heavy investments in hydropower dams that will increase social and political tension between counterparts. The distribution of the available lands for irrigation and income is high in downstream, while upstream argues to have right over water to generate own benefits in producing energy. In this research we analyze impacts of the future dam construction in the middle stream of the Zeravshan river basin through framework of several models to address future policy on the water resources regulation. To balance usage of the water resources between participators to reach a better economic outcomes between argues.