What to do with water in Kazakhstan?

An interesting question was recently asked — what would I do in the current situation?

Thank God I'm not the acting minister, but since the question was asked, I decided to try on the shoes.

First, we need to clearly separate water into groups — wastewater, sludge, groundwater, drinking water, irrigation water, etc. And explain this to people. Here, it's often all just "water."

Second, an inventory of the entire water management system is needed. After Yelzhasov and his mythical hydrometric posts, nothing surprises anymore, and we need to clearly understand the infrastructure here.

And third, we need to understand exactly where and how much water is being lost. We know the inflow clearly, but where and how much we consume — that's a gray darkness and uncertainty. More precisely, we know one thing: we consume exactly as much water as we have. If there is more precipitation and runoff, we consume more; if less, we consume less.

The Ministry of Ecology, in its time, fixated on the company Rubicon, which has a not-so-clean reputation, and wanted to measure water at the intake. But what's the point if our leaky canals in Kyzylorda are watering the desert?

Zulfiya is undoubtedly great for having begged more water from Uzbekistan, but there's little point in that. It's like a father in a family who begged for a higher salary because everyone in the family is complaining there's nothing to eat, and then it turns out one son never leaves the casino, another loves XO Hennessy in the morning, and the eldest daughter changes her new electric car every week.

In the end, by automating a mess, you'll get an automated mess on the output, and the time for playing games with water is already over; it's no longer a joking matter.