Experts and politicians in Kyrgyzstan have expressed disquiet about possible serious environmental consequences that the country could suffer as a result of neighbouring Kazakhstan’s use of “cloud-seeding” rain-making technology to combat drought.

Another of Kyrgyzstan’s neighbours, Uzbekistan, is, meanwhile, getting ready to run its own experiments in producing artificial rain.

Former prime minister of Kyrgyzstan, Akylbek Japarov, wrote on social media networks that artificially producing rain in one place could negatively affect the climate in another, saying: “The mountain ecosystem is especially sensitive to such changes. The Kyrgyz Republic is one of the leading countries in the formation of water resources in the region. Currently, our glaciers are melting rapidly. Rivers, lakes and the water balance directly depend on moisture circulation, temperature and precipitation.

“If the technology of artificially influencing the atmosphere begins to be widely used in the region, its consequences may be longlasting and affect the entire ecosystem of Central Asia."

Expert Kanatbek Kumushbek was reported by Azattyk on June 1 as saying that Kyrgyzstan should take urgent action "before this experience [with Kazakhstan] becomes a precedent".

"First, negotiations. There are enough platforms: the SCO [Shanghai Cooperation Organisation], the Central Asian format [C5] and bilateral dialogue with Kazakhstan. The issue of transboundary weather modification should be put on the agenda.

“Secondly, registration of the database. Kyrgyzhydromet should record current indicators of precipitation, glacier balance and the level of [mountain lake] Issyk-Kul right now. This is necessary for the future – if we have to make a complaint in a few years or after, we will need figures from before that."

Kazakhstan is the first country in Central Asia to try out rain-making technology. It is working with the UAE's National Meteorological Centre on its artificial rain initiative.

Kazakhstan's Vice Minister of Ecology Mansur Oshurbbayev has described the rain-making approach as environmentally friendly, a harmless measure that does not cause drought in neighbouring countries. Kazakhstan is implementing the technological project jointly with representatives of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), he added.

The experiment in Kazakhstan is focused on 911 hectares of land within a radius of 5 kilometres (3.1 miles) in the drought-prone southern region of Turkestan.

Cloud seeding, a form of geoengineering, is used to make clouds turn into rain or snow. Silver iodide is sprayed from aircraft onto clouds, which are made up of tiny droplets that “float” in the air. The chemical turns the droplets into solid particles and ice begins to form around them. When they become heavy enough, they fall from the sky as rain or snow.

There are experts who warn that rain-making could one day be widely described by countries that lose out on clouds which, without interference, would later turn into rain over their territory, as “rain theft”. A “rain theft” war somewhere in the future is not totally out of the question.

Zhanay Sagin, a professor at the University of Kazakhstan, cautioned, while speaking to RFE/RL: "If you take a cloud from one place, it will harm another place."