Future Sustainability Challenges in Hindu Kush-Himalaya - Impact of Global Changes on Mountains: Responses and Adaptation - page 255

and food and water security are the common challenges to the region. In
addition, confl icting demands for these international waters and existing
tensions both within and between countries indicate cooperation is
imperative for peace and security in the region (World Bank 2012a). The
HKH countries have intensifi ed cooperation for managing transboundary
landscapes. For example, at the 11th meeting of the Conference of the
Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), in Hyderabad,
India, representatives from India, Bhutan, China, India, Nepal and Pakistan
showed their interest to intensify cooperation for the management of the
Brahmaputra-Salween, Kailash, Kanchenjunga, and Karakoram-Pamir
transboundary landscapes (ICIMOD 2012a).
Case study 5: Need for a regional cooperation for monitoring and research:
Fig. 10.22
The Hindu Kush-Himalayan region has one of the least available data on
glaciers and has very limited monitoring or understanding of the thresholds
of climate change on the cryosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, and on
human society (Kohler and Maselli 2009, Xu 2007). Records of minimum
of ten or more year are relevant for climate and hydrological variability
and trend studies, but only two glaciers barely meet this requirement
N
Elevation Zone
0-1000 m
1001-2000 m
2001-4000 m
>4001 m
Hydrology station
Figure 10.22. Monitoring stations in the Hindu-Kush Himalayan (HKH) region. The World
Glacier Monitoring Service record shows only 97 monitoring stations in the HKH region in
May 2011 adopted from UNEP 2012a.