Experts discuss role of Hindu Kush Himalayas region & Arctic in the era of climate change

Kathmandu: At a time when both the Arctic and the Hindu Kush Himalayas (HKH) region – called the Third Pole – are facing temperature rise due to changing climate, experts gathered here in the Nepalese capital on Wednesday called for the sharing of insights from two of the planet’s most extreme regions.

“As the cryosphere thaws in both the Arctic and the Third Pole, the need for regional cooperation has never been more critical. We must address the triple planetary crisis of climate change, air pollution, and biodiversity loss, as a unified global community,” said Pema Gyamtsho, Director General at the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD).

Gyamtsho was speaking on the first day of the three-day first-ever Inter-Polar Conference organised jointly by ICIMOD and the Arctic Centre of the University of Lapland of Finland.

Headquartered in Kathmandu, ICIMOD is an intergovernmental knowledge and learning centre working on behalf of and for the people of the eight regional member countries – Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Myanmar, Nepal, and Pakistan.

The Arctic and the Third Pole both contain important elements of the cryosphere, the near-permanent presence of water in a frozen state. However, as temperatures in both regions are currently increasing, these frozen landscapes are rapidly thawing, impacting local communities, ecosystems, and the global environment.

“If Hindu Kush Himalayas is the pulse of the planet, then the Arctic is the ground where the heart beats. There are similarities in the challenges that the two regions are facing, but in the global climate fora, they are talked about separately. Through this conference, we aim to connect and share the insights from both these regions,” said Professor Kamrul Hossain, director of the Northern Institute for Environmental and Minority Law (NIEM) at the Arctic Centre and UArctic Chair (Law).

The Inter-Polar Conference aims to bridge the knowledge gap between the Arctic and the Third Pole, fostering cooperation and understanding between experts from both regions, a release from the ICIMOD said, adding, “These two distant corners of the world share common challenges brought about by climate change, and it's imperative that we work together to find sustainable solutions.”