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Climate change

Understanding the dynamics of climate change is a key factor for strategic planning in Central Asia.

1.2 °C
Approximate rise in average annual temperature since the mid-20th century.
20%
Approximate decrease in snow cover depth.
20%
Share of the region's population living in areas at high risk of (once-in-a-century) flooding.
2021 / 2024
Years in which the region experienced its most severe droughts.
2x
How much faster than the global average Central Asia's temperature is rising, accompanied by increased evaporation, glacier melt, and erratic precipitation.
About this track

Climate is becoming a “threat multiplier”: it intensifies water scarcity, undermines food security, and heightens regional tensions through complex and at times unpredictable interdependencies.

This interweaving of risks creates a high degree of uncertainty. This means that strategy must be both robust — resilient across a range of possible futures — and adaptive, capable of adjusting and recovering after change. This requires a clear understanding of the region’s climate trends, familiarity with the projections, and an awareness of their limitations.

Temperatures are rising markedly, and this trend is set to continue.

More detail is available in the book.

Research materials

Charts

Population living in poverty and in areas at high risk of flooding. Source: World Bank (2024).
Observed and reconstructed time series of glacier mass balance in Central Asia. Source: Barandun et al. (2020).
Map of major mountain ranges and glaciers. Source: Barandun et al. (2020).
Total emissions by sector across all five Central Asian countries under the Net Zero and Reference scenarios. Note: the chart on the left reflects the baseline scenario, while the chart on the right reflects the low-carbon development scenario.
Projected maximum one-day precipitation for 2065–2085. These ranges show the 10th (low) to 90th (high) percentile of projections for each Shared Socioeconomic Pathway (SSP). Historical ranges cover 1995–2014. Data source: IPCC, 2025.
Outlook to 2050

Scenarios

Regional risks:

Temperatures in Central Asia are rising nearly twice as fast as the global average, accompanied by increased evaporation, glacier melt, and erratic precipitation. Extreme events — droughts, floods, and landslides — are occurring with increasing frequency, threatening infrastructure and vulnerable segments of the population. Economic losses from water-related emergencies could reach 1.3% of GDP annually, while crop yields could decline by 30% by 2050.

Conclusion: without adaptation, the region faces chronic water instability and severe economic losses.
Agriculture in Central Asia is particularly vulnerable to climate change.

Uzbekistan is grappling with land degradation and soil salinization, which, combined with shifting precipitation patterns, is reducing crop yields and threatening food security. Tajikistan is experiencing the effects of high variability in water use, which affects irrigation and crop yields. In Kazakhstan's northern regions, climate zones are shifting, affecting grain production and pasture quality. Kyrgyzstan must contend with heat stress affecting agricultural crops, which is increasing irrigation demand against a backdrop of planned production growth.

While rising temperatures and increasingly variable precipitation are disrupting the customary conditions of agricultural production across the region, they are also opening strategic windows for early adaptation and innovation.
Climate change is also affecting the power sector — particularly visible where dependence on hydropower is high:

In Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, shrinking glaciers and changing precipitation patterns are making river flow volumes harder to forecast, undermining the reliability of hydropower generation. Uzbekistan's power system faces a dual pressure: rising demand during periods of extreme heat, combined with constraints on the water needed to cool thermal power plants. In Kazakhstan, the energy sector faces both growing cooling demand and the need to shift toward renewable energy to reduce emissions.

Climate change is intensifying competition for water among sectors, which calls for careful, forward-looking planning.
Conclusions

Recommendations

  1. 1 Priority is given to "win-win" strategies that deliver benefits across a range of future climate scenarios, increase resilience, reduce vulnerability, and generate relevant co-benefits — such as improved water use, emergency preparedness, and better public health outcomes.
  2. 2 Investment in transport, water supply, and energy must account for extreme weather events: new projects should be designed for increasing precipitation intensity and linked to disaster risk management systems. As a practical priority for protecting critical infrastructure, water supply, energy, and transport systems should be modernized with future climate conditions in mind.
  3. 3 Early warning systems must be established, preparedness systems for floods, landslides, and avalanches developed, and climate risks integrated into the long-term development plans of key sectors. As a practical priority, comprehensive risk and vulnerability assessments are identified for the following sectors: agriculture; energy; water resources; healthcare — with risk maps for each sector and the development of cross-sectoral action plans.
  4. 4 Climate-resilient practices must be introduced — crop diversification, efficient irrigation, soil conservation, crop rotation and fertilization, and afforestation. As a practical priority for this track, long-term programs for reforestation and combating desertification are envisaged: land restoration, halting soil degradation, and forming a unified regional strategy for adapting to climate and demographic change.
  5. 5 Agricultural strategies must be aligned with the real availability of water resources: this requires either securing water for planned initiatives or adapting agricultural practices to water scarcity. As a practical priority, a coordinated agricultural and water policy is identified: transitioning to sustainable agricultural practices, expanding the cultivation of less water-intensive crops, and reducing dependence on irrigation.