Wednesday, September 21, 2005
BANGKOK, Thailand, September 6, 2005 (ENS) - The mountains of Asia, including the towering Himalayas, are facing accelerating threats from a rapid rise in roads, settlements, overgrazing and deforestation, experts are warning in a new report.
New calculations by experts with the Chinese Academy of Sciences indicate that China’s highland glaciers are shrinking by an amount equivalent to all the water in the giant Yellow River each year.
There is concern that the region’s water supplies, fed by glaciers and the monsoons and vital for around half the world’s population, may be harmed alongside the area’s abundant and rich wildlife.
"Mountain areas are especially important and particularly vulnerable," said Klaus Toepfer, executive director of the UN Environment Programme (UNEP). "These are the water towers of the world and often home to unique wildlife species upon which local people depend for food, medicines and other important materials. They have often been saved from uncontrolled development by their remoteness. But modern engineering methods mean this is no longer the case," he said.
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