Water consumption of agriculture and natural ecosystems along the River in China and

Niels Thevs1,3, Sabir Nurtazin2, Volker Beckmann3, Ruslan Salmyrzali2, Altyn Akimalieva3

1World Agroforestry Center, Central Asia Office, Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan 2Biological Faculty, Kazakh National University Al-Farabi, , Kazakhstan 3Institute of Botany and Landscape Ecology University of Greifswald, Germany

Introduction Ili Balkash Basin Methods Results

Presentation is part of the project:

Ecosystem conservation and sustainable land use in the Ili-Delta, Balkhash Lake, Kazakhstan, under decreasing water resources BMBF, 2014-2016 The Ili Balkash Basin

Major wetland of Central Asia: Ili Delta, ca. 8000 km² Largest Lake of Central Asia: , 17000 km² Construction of Reservoir in 1974

Major agricultural areas The Ili Delta and its vegetation The Ili Delta and its vegetation ESS in the Delta, mainly from wetlands

Provisioning: Fodder (-> food from animal products), fish (spawning place), game Raw material (-> construction material, chip boards, paper)

Regulating: C-Sequestration Regulation of water quality for Lake Balkhash

Cultural: Opportunities for recreation (hunting, fishing, bird watching) Information and inspiration Provisioning ESS

Provisioning: Fodder (-> food from animal products), fish (spawning place), game Raw material (-> construction material, chip boards, paper)

Regulating: • Life stock is grazed throughout the C-Sequestration delta on non-submerged areas. Regulation of water quality for Lake Balkhash • 60% of the fish catch of Lake Balkhash grow up in the open waters in the Ili Delta. Cultural: Opportunities for• recreationChipboard (/hunting fodder, factoryfishing ,is bird going watching to ) be operating in Karoi. Information and inspiration • Paper factory is planned in Zhideli.

Land cover classes for monetizing ESS

Lake Balkhash Water bodies in the delta Submerged dense reed Non-submerged dense reed Open reed and shrub

SubmergedN dense reed -> raw material: 854 km², biomass more than 800,000 t Grazed reed area: 1264 km² Water resources

80% of the runoff into Lake Balkhash comes from the Ili River. 70% of the runoff of the Ili River comes from China. Headwaters of the Ili River: Tianshan

1960s 1970s Past 10 years Runoff into Lake 15 12.2 – 12.9 12 – 20 Balkhash [km³/a] Lake area [km²] 18,000 16,000 Lake water level 343 341 342.2 – 342.7 [m a.sl.]

Kapchagay Reservoir was filled.

Kapchagay Reservoir not further filled. Enhanced Glacier -> increased runoff.

Petr, 1992; Abdrasilov and Tulebaeva 1994; Esekin et al., 2011; Dostaj et al., 2006; 2012 Changes in agriculture

Agricultural land [ha] in the Ili river basin from 1970s to 2013 Country 1970s 1990s 2001 2013 Kazakhstan 1.242.170 1.093.362 613.317 492.958* China 572.294 630.928 808.551 940.276 Total 1.814.464 1.724.290 1.421.868 1.433.234

*Part of the fields in Kazakhstan are planted only if there is enough water available. This figure only reflects 2013.

Crops

China: wheat, corn, rice, Kazakhstan rape China Kazakhstan: wheat, corn, alfalfa, rice Kyrgyzstan 0 200 km Agricultural land 2013 Upstream – downstream conflict

Agriculture has been expanded in the Ili river basin. Further expansion of agriculture is to expect. Water consumption most likely will be increasing.

Upstream – downstream conflict: Agriculture vs. delta with wetland complex downstream China upstream vs. Kazakhstan downstream.

Water competition will be aggravated due to climate change.

Investigate water consumption upstream and downstream, agriculture and natural ecosystems. One part of the whole project, towards a picture of benefits (including ESS) from water consumption. Determine evapotranspiration (ET)

Point measurements: Lysimeter, Eddy towers -> costly Climate data (e.g. Penman-Monteith) -> indirect method, many assumptions

Mapping of larger areas: Interpolate climate data Remote sensing Method: S-SEBI approach – ETpot

MODIS 16d-Albedo MODIS 8d-Land Surface Temperature

Latitude Potential evapotranspiration (ETpot) Trans- missivity Method II: ETf ETa

Pixels with vegetation: actual evapotranspiration (ETa) between ETpot and zero. ETa and Land surface temperature (LST) follow a linear relationship. ETf: the amount of ET which is realised:

LSThot pixel – LST ETf = ––––––––––––––––––– ETa = ETpot * ETf

LSThot pixel – LSTcold pixel

Hot pixel: Pixel with ETf = 0, ETa = 0. -> LST is high: bare land, desert. Cold pixel: Pixel with ETf = 1, ETa = ETpot. -> LST is low: wetland vegetation.

Total ETa of growing season 2014

Lake Balkhash

Ili Delta

China Kazakhstan ETa [mm] 1400 700 0

Kyrgyzstan 0 200 km

In green: agriculture not covered by ET-mapping -> estimated through avergae ETf. Average ETa [mm]

Average ETa [mm] over the growing seasons 2005-2014 of agriculture and reed dominated vegetation in theIli River Delta

Year 2005 2009 2010 2014 China Agriculture 554 544.6 587.1 566.6 Kazakhstan Agriculture 486.8 483.7 475.7 437.7 Submerged reed area Ili- 985.7 865.2 921.9 858.7 Delta Grazed reed areas Ili 595.5 457.3 458.2 422.6 Delta ETa [km³] per growing season, Ili river basin

Year 2005 2009 2010 2014 China Agriculture mapped 3.01 2.96 3.19 3.07 Agriculture estimated 2.34 2.27 2.46 2.39 China total 5.35 5.23 5.65 5.46 Kazakhstan Agriculture mapped 1.77 1.75 1.68 1.55 Agriculture estimated 0.56 0.55 0.53 0.49 Submerged reed area Ili-Delta 0.88 0.77 0.82 0.77 Grazed reed areas Ili Delta 1.56 1.2 1.2 1.11 Kazakhstan total 4.78 4.27 4.24 3.92 Total 10.12 9.51 9.89 9.38 Discussion

Comparison of results with S-SEBI study of Heihe river basin, China (Hochmuth et al., 2014): Average ETa of agriculture Ili river basin in China: 566 mm in 2013. ETa of corn in Heihe river baisn: 667 mm.

Increasing ETa in China: shift to more rice, improved water supply to crops.

Hotspot of ET in Kazakhstan: Kapchagay Reservoir. Decreasing ETa in Kazakhstan due to agriculture and mainly due to degradation of reed vegetation in Ili Delta (coincides with field observations: reed vegetation partly degraded). Thank you for your attention

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