THE STATUS OF THE SOVIET UNION'S NORTH-SOUTH WATER TRANSFER PROJECTS BEFORE THEIR ABANDONMENT IN 1985-86

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Abstract
In 1985-86, the Soviet Union shelved two major north-south water transfer projects that had been a subject of study and debate for decades. One was the ambitious project to transfer water from the West Siberian Plain southward through Kazakhstan to the deserts of Central Asia; the other was a project to transfer water from northern European Russia southward into the Volga River basin. The Siberia-Central Asia project was the first to be shelved, and this decision became evident in November 1985, when it was not included in the preliminary draft of the guidelines for the new five-year plan 1986-90. The European transfer project was next to be abandoned; after having been included in the preliminary draft, this project was dropped from the final version of the draft made public in March 1986. Philip P. Micklin, who is one of the foremost Western experts on the Soviet water transfer projects, reviews the status of the water diversion plan and the arguments pro and con before the decision to abandon these projects was taken by the Soviet leadership under Mikhail S. Gorbachev. (For Soviet evaluations of the projects, see articles in Soviet Geography, May 1983 and December 1983.) Partial support for this research was provided by the Lucia Harrison Fund of the Department of Geography, Western Michigan University.

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