Named the serious consequences of the melting of the Himalayan ice for millions of people

A report released Tuesday by the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) examines the impact of climate change on an area spanning 1.6 million square miles (4.1 million square kilometers) from Afghanistan in the west to Myanmar in the east.

According to the report, glaciers around the Hindu Kush and the Himalayan mountain range melted 65% faster in the 2010s compared to the previous decade, according to the report, suggesting warmer temperatures are already having an impact.

Ice and snow in the region feed 12 rivers that provide fresh water to two billion people in 16 countries, including China, India and Pakistan, and eventually too much water will eventually lead to water shortages, the report warns.

The same group published a report in 2019 that found that even in the most optimistic case, where average global warming was limited to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial temperatures, the region would have lost at least a third of its glaciers.

The group’s updated report shows that those forecasts have worsened since then.

With a warming of 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius, the world’s highest mountain region could lose 30% to 50% of its volume by 2100, according to the latest report.

If global warming exceeds 3 degrees Celsius, glaciers in Nepal and Bhutan in the eastern Himalayas risk losing 75% of their ice, and just one degree more, up to 80%, according to the report.

According to the forecasts of the World Meteorological Organization, the average annual global temperature at the earth’s surface in the period from 2023 to 2027 will be 1.1-1.8 degrees Celsius higher than the average for 1850-1900

Scientists see a 1.5 degree warming as a key tipping point, after which the likelihood of extreme floods, droughts, wildfires and food shortages could skyrocket.

“On all three pillars of action on climate change – mitigation, adaptation and loss and damage – we are at an impasse or on the wrong track; while the consequences of inaction are getting worse every day,” says Prof. Salimul Huq, director of the International Center for Climate Change and Development in Bangladesh.

About 240 million people live in the Hindu Kush Himalayan region, many of their cultures are thousands of years old, and another 1.65 billion live downstream.

Many high mountain communities depend on glacial water to irrigate their crops and support their livestock, but accelerated melt will flood farmland downstream, followed by periods of drought as water sources dry up, the report says.

Erosion of glacial slopes also increases the likelihood of floods, landslides and avalanches, increasing the risk to millions of people living in mountain communities.

“For them, it is their home and their livelihood mainly depends on agriculture, animal husbandry, tourism, and medicinal and aromatic plants,” said report co-author Amina Maharjan, Senior Livelihood and Migration Specialist at ICIMOD.

“What we learned from doing this assessment is that they are all very, very sensitive to subtle changes in climate and cryospheric conditions in the region,” she said.

For example, snowfall patterns are increasingly inconsistent with seasonality, leading to pasture infestation and reduced grazing land for livestock, Maharjan explained. Over the past half decade, yaks have died due to food shortages in India, Nepal and Bhutan, causing farmers to lose huge incomes, she added.

The remoteness and rugged terrain of the region also means that mountain communities often do not have access to immediate disaster response.

“Given that two billion people in Asia depend on the water that the local glaciers and snow contain, the consequences of the loss of this cryosphere are too great to be predicted. We need leaders who must act now to avert catastrophe,” said Isabella Coziell, Deputy Director General of ICIMOD.

Unique species are also threatened by adverse climate change in diverse ecosystems that include tropical and subtropical rainforests, temperate coniferous forests and cold deserts, the report says.