Dear Arno
Thank you again for your information ,I absolutely agree with you on the vast drought issues such as dried wetlands and rivers in Iran which could not tackled solely by local wetland constructions. they need more comprehensive and various approaches
In addition, above crisis and disasters, water resources here in Iran almost rely on ground water which also is under sever tension due to extra exploitation and rain falling decrease for more than one decade (water scarcity).
Watershed level drpping make water resources on critical tension, so certainly single or even 2 to 3 solutions could not respond to this disaster, but I have multi-layer proposal responds for water scarcity adaptation and drought consequences such as dust and sand storms which I name it sanitation for equal and sustainable development in safe water reusing , food safety and security , environment and ecosystem protection ,climate change consequences mitigation and clean energy which need planning and national contribution the first plan is encouraging to local wetland constructions is the local cost-effective wetlands construction in rural areas in order to create green scattered colonies in along with and around country which are practical and applicable even in remote rural areas for villages survival and protection of dust and sand storms, improve climate and biodiversity and wild life saving.
Second plan is creating network sanitation for artificial mega size wetland as long term and sustainable approach needs to comprehensive planning ,investment in national level.

Best regards

Sincerely your
Mohammad

Indeed Mohammed I do recall. This must have been at the groundwater meeting just while SuSanA was being started. Here's the llink from that meeting! www.susana.org/en/resources/conference-m.../67-iys-symposium-08

Question is when one witnesses major water diversions that cause the disappearance of lakes and rivers such as in the case of Hamoun, can remediation from wastewater compensate the large-scale impact? Certainly for some small-scale per-urban farming in the area, the wastewater reuse idea should be feasible. Whole scale desertification that we have seen in Hamoun is a mega-sized challenge to solve, also requiring trans-boundary agreements.

theiranproject.com/blog/2015/02/21/the-d...tlands-irans-sorrow/

earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/hamoun/



And one can only imagine what the impacts on security can be of this sort of rapid change that we have witnessed.
Regards
--Arno

Thanks Arno for your kindly mail and invaluable information , I am free researcher in water safety and waste water .
Progressive drought in Iran in recent years has affected the country even in the fertile plains which is considered as a high risk. I am very interested in water reusing and recycling, drought rehabilitation and its consequences' mitigation and I wonder whether you remember we had a short dialogue after you had presented about using urine as fertilizer in Hanover In Germany in 2008 ?

Thanks again. I always follow your innovative works in sanitation and water resources management .

With best regards;

Sincerely yours

Mohammad

Thanks Mohammed for this important post. Do you have any estimates of the potential surface area that could be stabilized using constructed wetlands in Iran? Using shallow, sub-surface flow rehabilitation? Species of plants that can do best?

SuSanA has a selection of publications on the topic. See for starters:
www.susana.org/en/resources/library/details/930
www.susana.org/en/resources/library/details/953

Also the Chinese have much large-scale impact on controlling desertification.
See the attached PDF from Wang Tao, Academy of Sciences in Lanzhou.

Regards

Iran faces with sand and dust storms in vast fields because of war(s) consequences destroyed a large fields natural wetlands war against Iran ( 1990) Kuwaiti Invasion by Iraq and then Persian Gulf war (USA and Allies for recapturing occupied Kuwait by Saddam ) USA attack Iraq , water scarcity and long term Drought .

Not only Ecosystem (Environment & biodiversity and wild life , ....) are impacted but also the people daily life also is paralyzed and health threats risks risen , So I strong believe sanitation approaches such artificial wetland constructions by using waste water treatment and reusing wetland charging for increasing soil wetting increasing and green plants coverage bio remediation applicable approaches to these hazard phenomena .Millions liter waste water (toilet) realize in traditional absorbed well which can safe reusing for dealing with dried soil and dust and sand storm.
Iran and UN are hosted 34 countries in an international conference in Tehran which discuss these regional challenges .(attached poster) [attachment=6252](1).j