One of the entries notes that the lake is salty, which is interesting; the area of the Takla Makan (tr. roughly as, “go in, won’t come out”) was a huge inland meltwater lake during the last glaciation. That raised the water table and leached out the salts still in the rocks, brought that to the surface.
Same thing went on during the Soviet era in Central Asia — dozens or maybe hundreds of dams were built with the intent of providing irrigation, and instead, the Aral Sea basin became infertile. The Soviet-built Aswan High Dam is doing the same thing in Egypt. Former President Mubarak was trying to build out from Lake Nasser and use those waters to irrigate the desert west of the Nile, which is similar to what the Israelis have done (use irrigation to leach the salts out of the surface soil and get it out in the runoff). Mubarak also built something he called the Peace Canal to run Nile waters into the Med coast of the Sinai, same intent.
For some reason, areas occupied by Muzzies turn into unliveable deserts. Can’t imagine why.
The lake is salty, but because of all the freshwater runoff that flows into the lake, it is much less salty than the oceans. Since it has been proclaimed a “biosphere” hopefully they won’t destroy the lake with irrigation schemes.