Relationship between Demographic Potential Indicators and Climatic Aspects of Water Stress

The purpose of this study is to determine the characteristics of demographic potential, its relationship with demographic security, as well as to analyze the influence, including environmental processes on the components of demographic potential. The work methodically substantiates the selection of indicators for calculating demographic potential and demographic security. In accordance with this, integrated indices of demographic potential were calculated for the EAEU countries. In general, the demographic potential for the EAEU countries according to their indices can be assessed as follows: 1. Kazakhstan (5.75); 2. Kyrgyzstan (5.51); 3. Belarus (5.07); 4. Armenia (4.86). 5. Russian Federation (4.06). The analysis showed that each country has the potential for its further development by improving the indicators included in the integral index. As a result, the presented methodological approaches made it possible to calculate integral indices to determine the position of each EAEU country in terms of demographic potential, determine the indicator of demographic security in Kyrgyzstan, and link the processes of external migration from Kyrgyzstan with the shortage of water resources in the country. The methodology we presented for determining the state of demographic potential and demographic security allows us to carry out calculations of this phenomenon for any country

Active Tectonics Around Almaty and along the Zailisky Alatau Rangefront

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Wiley via http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2017TC004657/abstractThe Zailisky Alatau is a >250-km-long mountain range in Southern Kazakhstan. Its northern rangefront around the major city of Almaty has more than 4 km topographic relief, yet in contrast to other large mountain fronts in the Tien Shan, little is known about its Late Quaternary tectonic activity despite several destructive earthquakes in the historical record. We analyse the tectonic geomorphology of the rangefront fault using field observations, differential GPS measurements of fault scarps, historical and recent satellite imagery, metre-scale topography derived from stereo satellite images, and decimetre-scale elevation models from UAV surveys. Fault scarps ranging in height from ~2 m to >20 m in alluvial fans indicate surface rupturing earthquakes occurred along the rangefront fault since the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Minimum estimated magnitudes for those earthquakes are M6.8- 7. Radiocarbon dating results from charcoal layers in uplifted river terraces indicate a Holocene slip rate of ~1.2-2.2 mm/a. We find additional evidence for active tectonic deformation all along the Almaty rangefront, basinward in the Kazakh platform, and in the interior of the Zailisky mountain range. Our data indicate the seismic hazard faced by Almaty comes from a variety of sources, and we emphasize the problems related to urban growth into the loess-covered foothills and secondary earthquake effects. With our structural and geochronologic framework we present a schematic evolution of the Almaty rangefront that may be applicable to similar settings of tectonic shortening in the mountain ranges of Central Asia

Active tectonics around Almaty and along the Zailisky Alatau rangefront

The Zailisky Alatau is a >250 km long mountain range in Southern Kazakhstan. Its northern rangefront around the major city of Almaty has more than 4 km topographic relief, yet in contrast to other large mountain fronts in the Tien Shan, little is known about its Late Quaternary tectonic activity despite several destructive earthquakes in the historical record. We analyze the tectonic geomorphology of the rangefront fault using field observations, differential GPS measurements of fault scarps, historical and recent satellite imagery, meter-scale topography derived from stereo satellite images, and decimeter-scale elevation models from unmanned aerial vehicle surveys. Fault scarps ranging in height from ~2 m to >20 m in alluvial fans indicate that surface rupturing earthquakes occurred along the rangefront fault since the Last Glacial Maximum. Minimum estimated magnitudes for those earthquakes are M6.8–7. Radiocarbon dating results from charcoal layers in uplifted river terraces indicate a Holocene slip rate of ~1.2–2.2 mm/a. We find additional evidence for active tectonic deformation all along the Almaty rangefront, basinward in the Kazakh platform, and in the interior of the Zailisky mountain range. Our data indicate that the seismic hazard faced by Almaty comes from a variety of sources, and we emphasize the problems related to urban growth into the loess-covered foothills and secondary earthquake effects. With our structural and geochronologic framework, we present a schematic evolution of the Almaty rangefront that may be applicable to similar settings of tectonic shortening in the mountain ranges of Central Asia