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The Aral Sea was, once upon a time, the fourth largest lake on the planet. But, since the 1960s, the lake has been shrinking. As you might suspect, it has not been shrinking of its own accord. Rather, the Soviets began diverting water from the lake to irrigate cotton, a program designed to pump money into the Soviet economy. But in true Soviet style, the irrigation projects were poorly run and totally inefficient, and tremendous amounts of water were wasted.

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