Supporting Aralkum National Park

Aralkum National Park was established in 2022 across around one million hectares of the former Aral Sea landscape in Muynak district, Uzbekistan. Its creation was a major step for the protection of Resurrection Island and the surrounding desert, but designation was only the beginning. For the new protected area to deliver for saigas and other wildlife, it needed monitoring systems, trained staff, equipment, clear management approaches, and a stronger understanding of how wildlife was using this rapidly changing landscape.

SCA has helped support that transition from protected area on paper to conservation in practice. Working with Uzbek partners, we developed biodiversity monitoring approaches for the park, identified priority species and monitoring locations, supplied field equipment, and supported training for staff responsible for wildlife monitoring. Camera traps and field surveys have generated new information on saigas and a wide range of other species, helping build the evidence needed for future management.

This work has also strengthened local conservation capacity. In 2022, SCA supported practical training in Muynak for 11 staff recruited through Uzbekistan’s ecology and forestry authorities, covering camera-trap monitoring, equipment use, field techniques, and data collection. Monitoring subsequently documented dozens of species across Resurrection Island and the wider Aralkum landscape, including records of saiga, caracal, steppe tortoise, golden eagle, and other threatened and characteristic desert wildlife.

Alongside monitoring and ranger capacity, SCA and its partners have contributed to wider work on ecological zoning, protected-area management, tourism planning, and the development of longer-term conservation approaches for the area. Supporting Aralkum is therefore about more than establishing a boundary. It is about helping build the knowledge, skills, and practical systems needed for a new protected area to safeguard saigas and the wider Aral Sea ecosystem.

With thanks to our funders
This work has been supported by the People’s Trust for Endangered Species, Darwin Initiative, Whitley Fund for Nature, and the Beagle Charitable Foundation.

Project partners
This work has involved the Institute of Zoology of the Uzbek Academy of Sciences, the University of Oxford, and Uzbek environmental and forestry authorities.