Not even a drop of the Amu Darya is nowadays reaching the Aral Sea, according to reporters who travelled the length of the Central Asian river gathering reports on the collapse of an ecosystem that survived for millennia before human activities triggered its destruction.

The Amu Darya fed what was once the world's third-largest lake from the south (the Syr Darya did the same from the east) but by now, as VOA reported on October 18, not even dribs and drabs of the river reach the meagre strips of water that make up what remains of the Aral.

All of the Amu Darya—a river created by the convergence of the Vakhsh and Panj rivers in the mountains between Afghanistan and Tajikistan—is these days channelled for human use, largely in agriculture. The river, in other words, ends with something of a journey to nowhere.

“The Amu Darya is now fully utilised for agriculture and other economic needs,” Rustam Saparbayev, deputy chairman of the parliament of Karakalpakstan, Uzbekistan's northwestern part, told VOA (Uzbek news video account of report here).

With all of the river directed into five canals in southern Karakalpakstan, Saparbayev lamented that there isn’t enough water for both the sea and the population.

“This is the hardest decision for us. Our priority is the immediate needs of our people. We rely on the Amu Darya to grow our crops and livestock. Water is extremely scarce in this environment, and we must prioritise food and water security,” he was further reported as saying.

Of course, it might be said that the loss of the tiny amount of the Amu Darya that was still reaching the Aral was a heavy moment only in terms of symbolism—the environmental disaster sparked in the 1960s as the Soviets pursued irrigation plans based on water diversion to drive up production of cotton, or “white gold”, long ago destroyed the main body of the sea.

For a view of any substantial remnants of the Aral, the traveller must head north to Kazakhstan, where there has been some success in reviving parts of the sea’s northern shores.

For their part, the Karakalpaks appear to be in a near-hopeless situation. “We can still save the Aral Sea, but it will require a global effort. No matter what we hear from the UN and other organisations, and despite current assistance, there won’t be significant change without concrete action,” said Saparbayev.

“There are international missions to save exotic animals and historic sites. The Aral Sea needs similar attention. In our view, the solution is bringing water — but from outside our region, as it can no longer come from the Amu Darya,” he said.