Melting Himalayas put India’s economy, water, infrastructure at risk

Himalayan glaciers are losing mass 65% faster than they were a decade ago, increasing risks to communities, infrastructure and India's economy, according to new research, BBC reports.

The report by global consultancy Systemiq, produced with the Integrated Mountain Initiative and with technical contributions from the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) and GB Pant National Institute of Himalayan Environment, said only about 21 of an estimated 40,000 glaciers across the Himalaya-Karakoram region were being monitored in detail on a sustained basis.

As glaciers retreat, expanding glacial lakes can become increasingly unstable, while warming can destabilise permafrost and high-mountain slopes, raising the risk of cascading disasters, the report said.

India has already experienced the consequences. A glacial lake outburst flood in Sikkim in 2023 killed at least 70 people and damaged roads, bridges and hydropower projects. A similar disaster in Uttarakhand in 2021 killed more than 200 people.

The government said in July that 56 glacial lakes had been classified as "very high risk" following a 2025 assessment of 189 high-risk lakes. The Central Water Commission is monitoring 2,485 glacial lakes larger than 10 hectares across India's Himalayan river basins.

The economic risks extend beyond sudden floods. The Himalayas supply rivers supporting hundreds of millions of people across South Asia, while ICIMOD expects "peak water" in most Hindu Kush Himalayan river basins around the middle of the century, after which glacier runoff is expected to decline.

The Systemiq research estimates that Himalayan water supports roughly 20% of India's GDP through wheat, rice, tea, hydropower and pilgrimage-related activities. Yet Himalayan states capture only about 5% of that value, it said.

"The Himalayas are the Third Pole," said economist Lord Nicholas Stern, chair of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics. "Unlike the Arctic or Antarctic, this pole has hundreds of millions of people living beneath it."

"This is national and international infrastructure," he said, warning that the ecological system underpinning it is "approaching a tipping point".

The report estimates that about a third of Himalayan glacier melt is driven by black carbon, much of it from brick kilns in the plains. Soot deposited on snow and ice absorbs sunlight and accelerates melting.

"The Himalayas are approaching a tipping point, with millions of lives and livelihoods hanging in the balance," said Arushi Chopra, Systemiq's senior director and lead author. "Glaciers are melting faster than they were a decade ago."

The report recommends 10 priority measures, including reducing black-carbon emissions, expanding glacier monitoring, strengthening disaster early-warning systems and changing how tourism is developed in the mountains.

The Indian Himalayan region receives roughly 400 million tourist visits a year, according to the report. Researchers said tourism policy should focus less on maximising visitor numbers and more on generating value that is retained and reinvested locally.

Pema Gyamtsho, director general of ICIMOD, said the risks were becoming increasingly complex.

"Glaciers are retreating, permafrost and high-mountain slopes are becoming increasingly unstable, and communities and infrastructure downstream face growing risks from complex and cascading hazards," he said.

Such risks cross national boundaries, he added.

"do not respect national borders, and no single country can address them alone".

The report called for stronger cross-border monitoring, shared risk information, early-warning systems and joint investment in resilience to protect lives, livelihoods and economies dependent on the Himalayas.

By Aghakazim Guliyev