A prominent Syrian hydrologist has urged the new authorities to shut down hundreds of thousands of illegal wells that have caused a water “catastrophe” in the country by siphoning from its aquifers.
The wells, a large proportion of which were dug by farmers, households and businesses during the 2011-2024 civil war, are behind the drying up of hundreds of springs, and the depletion of Syria's few rivers and lakes, Abdelrazzaq Al Olaiwi told The National. “Everyone seems to have dug a well in Syria since 2011, so the numbers could be much higher,” he said. “The authorities must act.”
The management of Syria's water came into sharp focus last month when the Euphrates River flooded, damaging farms and fields in eastern Syria. The area produces most of the country's agricultural commodities and accounts for most of its energy output, through its oil and gas fields and hydroelectric dams on the Euphrates.
Yet Syria remains one of the most water-scarce countries. It ranks 12th worldwide for water stress – a measure of the pressure on a country's water resources and the sustainability of supply – according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).
The flooding does not alter the loss of Syria's “hydrological balance”, Mr Al Olaiwi said. He said the wells draw down the 10 billion cubic metres a year of rainwater and snowmelt that seep into Syria's seven underground reservoirs, water that would otherwise help replenish them.
The most depleted aquifers are in the east, the central Badia region and southern Syria. The coastal aquifer has sustained the least damage because the area receives the highest rainfall in the country, Mr Al Olaiwi said in a phone interview from Kassel in Germany. He worked in Syria's public irrigation sector before fleeing the country during the civil war and settling in Germany.
“The wells have caused a catastrophe,” said Mr Al Olaiwi. Any recovery plan for the water sector must start by addressing the wells. The water resources ministry, which the new administration merged with the energy ministry last year, needs to be restored as a separate entity so the sector receives sufficient attention, he said.
Crisis leaves Jordan thirsty
The most recent water resource to disappear in Syria was Muzayrib lake, on the edge of the southern Hauran Plain, which Syrian media said dried up completely last month. The lake is part of the Yarmouk aquifer, which Syria shares with Jordan. The reservoir has been depleted largely because of the wells on the Syrian side, Mr Al Olaiwi said.
“They have been a main cause of thirst in Jordan,” he said. Water scarcity in Jordan is more severe than in Syria, and the management of shared water resources has marred relations between the two countries for decades. Jordanian officials have said there has been progress since the ousting of Syria's former president Bashar Al Assad in December 2024.
Syria, as well as parts of Jordan, falls within an arid zone called the global drylands, characterised by low rainfall. The illegal wells began to proliferate in Syria in the decade before the 2011 revolt against Mr Al Assad.
The wells, as well as drought, caused water depletion in eastern Syria. That drove one million people from the area to Damascus and other urban centres in the west in the years before the civil war. Crop yields dropped and Syria began importing wheat. By 2010, the World Food Programme was helping to feed 200,000 Syrians, mostly in the east. The decline in living standards helped fuel the uprising in 2011.
During the war, the security apparatus's grip loosened, and people no longer had to bribe officials to dig wells, so the number of wells grew, Mr Al Olaiwi said.
He suggested revising agricultural subsidies to discourage farmers from planting water-intensive crops, such as cotton, in favour of crops that use less water but still generate a high return, such as olives. He also supports maintaining subsidies for wheat, with the aim of making Syria self-sufficient in the staple once again.
“Syria can become green,” Mr Al Olaiwi said. “But it will take a strategic vision.”
