himalyas

2011-11-03T03:07:00.001-07:00

Himalayas | 3

The Himalayas consist of several parallel ranges running

west to east, from the Indus River Valley to the Brahmaputra

River Valley; they form an arc 2,400 kilometres long, which

varies in width from 400 km in the western Kashmir-

Xinjiang region to 150 km in the eastern Tibet-Arunachal

Pradesh region.2 The Himalayas stretch across six countries:

Bhutan

, Nepal, India, Pakistan, China and Afghanistan.

The Himalayas are undoubtedly a world heritage. All

14 of the highest peaks in the world, called the “eightthousanders”

(peaks with heights greater than 8,000 metres)

are in the Himalayas. While UNESCO has declared the

Sagarmatha National Park near Mt. Everest in Nepal as a

World Heritage Site,3 there are hundreds of such undeclared

locations of equal magnificence and significance in the

Himalayas.

The name itself literally means “the abode of snow,”

and the Himalayan region is sometimes called the “Third

Pole,” as it has the most highly glaciated areas in the world

outside of the two Polar regions. It has huge stocks of water

in the form of snow and ice, with a total area of 35,110

km2 of glacier and ice cover, and a total ice reserve of 3,735

km3.4 Hundreds of small and large rivers originate and run

through the Himalayan region. It is the source of some of

the largest rivers in Asia – the Indus, Ganga, Brahmaputra,

and Irrawaddy – the basins of which are home to millions

of people. Glacial and snow melt is an important source of

the flows of these rivers.5

The rivers that originate in the Himalayas provide

sustenance, livelihoods and prosperity to millions of people

living in a vast area that stretches from the Indus Basin plains

of Pakistan in the west to Bangladesh in the east. With their

high slopes and huge quantities of fast-moving waters, the

Himalayan rivers have always been looked upon as having

large potential to generate hydroelectric power. Some of

the earliest and largest hydropower stations in the countries

of the Indian subcontinent have been built on Himalayan

rivers; for example, the Bhakra Nangal project in India and

the Tarbela project in Pakistan.

Recent years have seen a renewed push for building

dams in the Himalayas. Massive plans are underway in

Pakistan

, India, Nepal and Bhutan6 to build several hundred

dams in the region, with over 150,000 Megawatts (MW) of

additional capacity proposed in the next 20 years in the four

countries. If all the planned capacity expansion materialises,

the Himalayan region could possibly have the highest

concentration of dams in the world.

This dam building activity will fundamentally transform

the landscape, ecology and economy of the region and will

have far-reaching impacts all the way down to the river

deltas. Submergence of lands, homes, fields and forests on

a large scale will displace hundreds of thousands of people.

Damming and diversion of rivers will severely disrupt the

downstream flows, impacting agriculture and fisheries and

threatening livelihoods of entire populations. Degradation

of the natural surroundings and a massive influx of migrant

workers will have grave implications for the culture and

identity of local people, who are often distinct ethnic groups

small in numbers. As the entire region is seismically active,

Alex PriceAlex Price

himalyas