Tarim Basin deciduous forests and steppe
The Tarim River is an oasis that waters a strip 300 miles (500 km) long, running through China’s largest and driest desert, the Taklimakan. In the local Uygur language, tarim means "converging of waters." Among braided channels of water, forests of poplar stabilize the sand and moderate the climate. Much of this habitat, however, has been converted to agriculture, with native poplars planted as windbreaks along the edges of fields.
(National Geographic)
The destruction of natural riparian zones means the Tarim River will be more polluted by sediment of its' own watershed. Humans in the future will miss this river's prosperity as the river becomes more polluted and less navigable. Also, the increase in erosion will cut away at banks and can build up at the mouth of the river, where that soil will not be usable.
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