Changing water availability in mountain regions has a strong impact on water-dependent economic sectors such as energy and agriculture. The Syr Darya river basin figured as a non-European case study within the EU-FP7 ACQWA project (www.acqwa.ch), which aimed at identifying how climate change might impact rivalries among these sectors in mountain environments and adjacent lowlands (Beniston et al., 2011).
So far, most studies on water related challenges in Central Asia have focused either on climato-hydrological or on socio-political aspects.