Save one dying lake, save the Middle East?

(CNN) -- Lake Urmia in Iran used to be a site to reckon with.

Twenty years ago, it ranked as the sixth largest saltwater lake in the world, and the largest in the Middle East. Tourists would revel in the lake's buoyancy (like the Dead Sea, the salt level made it impossible to sink), and the flocks of flamingos, pelicans and yellow deer that once inhabited the surrounding areas.

Today, Urmia is a shadow of its former self. Decades of poor water management, aggressive agricultural policies and drought have rendered it almost completely dried up (according to the United Nations Development Program, the lake has shrunk by two-thirds since 1997).

Rusted boats lay abandoned in what is now essentially a giant salt flat. The tourists are long gone, as are many of the animals that once called the lake home.

"It's like seeing a scene from a different planet. I saw caterpillars and bobcats taking salt from the dead body of the lake," recalls Gary Lewis, the United Nations Resident Coordinator in Iran.

"It's a testament to how rapidly we can break something."

It's a problem that President Hassan Rouhani is aware of, and one he wants to fix. Last month, he agreed to spend $500 million in the first year alone of a ten-year recovery plan (the total bill is $5 billion).

"If the lake dries up, this kind of threat will not be comparable to any other threat," he said in a public statement in January.