An Ecological Disaster in the Past and One in the Making : State of the World from NPR

We go to the borders between Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Afghanistan to see the dried up shores of what was once one of the largest lakes in the world, the Aral Sea. Mismanagement of the rivers that fed the sea because of demand for irrigation in the dry region, caused the Aral Sea to slowly disappear. And now an irrigation project being undertaken by the Taliban government in Afghanistan threatens to disrupt the ecological and economic balance of one of the main sources of water in the region.