Atrickle of water has returned this winter to Zayandeh Rud (the Zayandeh River) through Isfahan, but it won’t last long. When the winter rainfall ends and the snow in the mountains has melted in spring, high demand for water will see the river bed return to the dusty, cracked state to which Isfahanis have become accustomed.
Simultaneously, desertification downstream of Isfahan threatens to spread as farmers struggle to irrigate their crops. In Kerman province, to the east, 15% of around 150,000 acres of pistachio trees in the main producing area have died in the last decade or so.
In Tehran, a different environmental crisis unfolds. School closures due to air pollution are now part of the winter routine, but there have been more this year than ever before. The smog results from a combination of exhaust fumes and dust blown in from dried-up river basins in the west of the country, with the Alborz Mountains to the north trapping the thick haze over the city’s millions of suffocating inhabitants.
Since 2010, Iran’s gross domestic product has shrunk by 15-20%, partly due to sanctions, taking unemployment up to 20% and far higher among the young.
These years have also brought environmental decline. Falling oil revenue, due partly to sanctions, and a faltering economy have reduced government resources available for environmental causes: the ‘economy of resistance’ has ensured thatspending has been directed at stimulating economic growth rather than encouraging environmental sustainability. Sanctions also fed a thirst for accelerated development that has exacerbated Iran’s environmental decline.
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