From a hillside, Kamal Saadat looked forlornly at hundreds of potential customers, knowing he could not take them for trips in his boat to enjoy a spring weekend on picturesque Oroumieh Lake, the third largest saltwater lake on earth.
“Look, the boat is stuck... It cannot move anymore,” said Saadat, gesturing to where it lay encased by solidifying salt and lamenting that he could not understand why the lake was fading away.
The long popular lake, home to migrating flamingos, pelicans and gulls, has shrunken by 60 per cent and could disappear entirely in just a few years, experts say — drained by drought, misguided irrigation policies, development and the damming of rivers that feed it. Until two years ago, Saadat supplemented his income from almond- and grape-growing by taking tourists on boat tours. But as the lake receded and its salinity rose, he found he had to stop the boat every 10 minutes to unfoul the propeller — and finally, he had to give up this second job that he’d used to support a five-member family.
“The visitors were not enjoying such a boring trip,” he said, noting they had to cross hundreds of meters of salty lakebed just to reach the boat from the wharf.
Other boatmen, too, have parked their vessels by their houses, where they stand as sad reminders of the deep-water days. And the lake’s ebbing affects an ever-widening circle.
In April, authorities stopped activities at the nearby jetty in Golmankhaneh harbour, due to lack of water in the lake, now only two meters deep at its deepest. Jetties in Sharafkhaneh and Eslami harbours faced the same fate. The receding water has also weakened hotel business and tourism activities in the area, and planned hotel projects remain idle since investors are reluctant to continue. Beyond tourism, the salt-saturated lake threatens agriculture nearby in northwest Iran. Many farmers worry about the future of their lands, which for centuries have been famous for apples, grapes, walnuts, almonds, onions, potatoes, as well as aromatic herbal drinks.
“The salty winds not only will affect surrounding areas but also can damage farming in remote areas,” said Masoud Mohammadian, an agriculture official.
Salman Zaker, a Parliament member for Oroumieh warned in April that, “with the current trend, the risk of a salt tsunami is increasing.” Warning that the lake would dry out within three to five years — an assessment agreed to by the local environment department director, Hasan Abbasnejad — Zaker said eight to 10 billion tons of salt would jeopardise life for millions of people.
Masoud Pezeshkian, another legislator and representative for city of Tabriz in the eastern part of the lake said, “The lake has been drying but neither government nor local officials took any step, so far.”
How did this disaster develop, and what can be done now?
Official reports blame the drying mainly on a decade-long drought, and peripherally on consumption of water of the feeding rivers for farming. They put 5 per cent of the blame on construction of dams and 3 per cent on other factors. Others disagree about the relative blame. The first alarm over the lake’s shrinking came in late 1990s amid a nagging drought.
Nonetheless, the government continued construction of 35 dams on the rivers which feed the lake; 10 more dams are on the drawing boards for the next few years.
Also completed was a lake-crossing roadway between Oroumieh and Tabriz, cities on the west and east of the lake. No environmental feasibility study was done in the planning for the road, and environmentalists believe the project worsened the lake’s health by acting as a barrier to water circulation. —AP