Saving Wetlands Sky High - High Altitude Wetlands Conservation Programme in the Himalayas

Geographical location:

Asia/Pacific > Asia General

Summary

Himalayan high altitude wetlands are crucial for biodiversity and sustainable economic growth, both locally and at river basin and regional levels. In addition, they regulate micro-climates and have immense livelihood, cultural and spiritual significance for local communities.

However, the wetlands and the catchments draining into them face increasing threats from climate change, tourism and unsustainable exploitation, which could have negative knock-on effects right down the river systems that they supply.

The project aims to replicate recent lessons learned in wetland conservation by WWF in India, Nepal, Pakistan and China. It will deal with a number of common themes, including climate change, tourism, Ramsar designation and institutional capacity building.

Background

High altitude wetlands in the Himalayas, which include lakes, marshes, and peat bogs, have several characteristics that make them unique in terms of biodiversity value. The plants and animals that occur in and around them are often endemic and highly adapted to their locations. Many of these wetlands depend entirely on snow melt or run-off from adjacent glaciers while often having outflows comprising small streams or rivers.

Many of them also play an absolutely essential role in the hydrological regime of some of the world's largest and most important rivers: the Ganges, Brahmaputra, Indus, Yangtze, Yellow, and Mekong. Each of these rivers are of great economic importance in terms of hydropower, transport, irrigation and fisheries; while some, such as the Ganges also have cultural or religious significance.

For example, the Ganges is not only home to the threatened Gangetic dolphin, its annual floods are essential for maintaining the gene pool integrity of fish populations in the Bangladeshi lowlands, for fertilizing and flushing the same lowlands and for recharging economically crucial groundwater. Disruption to the dynamics in the high altitude wetlands will have a knock-on effect that could reach a long way downstream, if not the open sea.

In addition to their hydrological importance at the basin level, these wetlands and the ecosystems they support are also critically important from a biodiversity conservation perspective, especially in the arid trans-Himalayas. These high altitude wetlands are characterized by unique biodiversities not found anywhere else.

High altitude wetlands also comprise the pivot of seasonal biological and socio-economic cycles and in some cases regulate or ameliorate local climates, yet due to their location in the high mountains where environmental conditions are extreme, they are very fragile and easily destroyed. The sustainability and productivity of these unique and crucial natural features are becoming increasingly compromised.

Threats include:

- climate change;
- insensitive development;
- easier access;
- rapid increase in tourism;
- over-grazing or changes in grazing practices;
- low levels of awareness at all levels;
- deforestation and unregulated harvesting of non-timber forest products;
- difficulties caused by trans boundary issues and a large military/paramilitary presence in some locations;
- other forms of forest exploitation; and
- changing agricultural practices.

Knock-on effects include:

- disrupted flood and turbidity cycles and hence negative biodiversity and economic consequences that could even extend into marine zones;
- intensified flooding;
- reduced productivity of existing downstream infrastructure; and
- increased pollution.

There is low awareness among policy and decision makers of the values of wetlands. As a result, local stakeholders face difficulties in tackling threats and exploiting opportunities associated with the sustainable conservation, exploitation and management of these valuable and unique resources.

Objectives

1. By 2050, the ecosystems, biodiversity, productivity and hydrological functions of high altitude wetlands and their immediate watersheds are fully sustainable along with local livelihoods, as a result of science-based participatory conservation and management strategies that are adaptive to climate change while respecting the cultural and religious practices of the communities concerned.

2. At least 20 well-managed high altitude wetlands in India, Nepal, Pakistan, China and Bhutan are benefiting local communities and sustaining freshwater ecological services by 2010.

Solution

WWF proposes a programme of technical and social interventions intended to raise awareness; strengthen and empower wetland communities; develop sustainable wetland management plans; assist with policy and regulatory framework formulation and facilitate conservation and wise use of resources.

The proposed programme has 6 modules, one dealing with regional issues, the others dealing with specific challenges in India, Nepal, Pakistan, Bhutan and China.

Regional Challenges and Opportunities

1. There is a need to identify and evaluate a range of sustainable institutional models for the conservation and wise use of the wetlands. It is important that stakeholders are fully involved in this; but this in turn requires that they are made adequately aware of the issues involved and that the project itself is aware of the significance of different issues to different stakeholders. Ideally, promising models should be pilot tested and subjected to participatory monitoring and evaluation.

2. There is significant benefit that would accrue to exchange visits between the teams working on the national modules (India, Nepal, Pakistan, Bhutan and China). Of particular benefit would be cross fertilisation of the different ideas and experience arising from community based work and the participatory development of high altitude wetland conservation and management plans. There would also be great value in exposing selected members of the “Himalayan” wetland team to the experiences and lessons learned by their opposite numbers working on a similar programme in the Andes.

3. Specialist training in the broader aspects of mountain development is needed. Not only will this be necessary to broaden the skills base of the country team members selected for such training, it will also expose them the broader issues concerning the socio-economic context in which they are trying to establish difficult conservation paradigms.

4. A regional forum should be set up to consolidate experience, monitor progress, function as a clearing house for new knowledge and maintain cross border dialogue. Ideally, the reach of such a forum should go beyond those countrys scheduled for field programmes under this proposal to include all 10 countries in the region with high altitude wetlands.

5. A small grants component is required to finance conservation and research efforts falling under the regional aegis and limited unforeseen but convincing opportunities in the country programmes.

6. It is intended that at least 30 high altitude wetlands will receive Ramsar designation as a result of the programme. In addition to facilitating this process from a regional perspective, there is also a need for a consolidated, science based assessment, agglomerated at a regional level of the impacts of climate change on Himalayan high altitude wetlands. Some of the material for this could emanate from the country programmes, but a regional consolidation and assessment would be extremely valuable, especially if it could feed into the Ramsar process by the Ramsar CoP scheduled for 2011.