New Delhi, Sep 14: Himalayan glaciers are losing mass 65 per cent faster than they were a decade ago, with expanding glacial lakes, unstable mountain slopes and inadequate monitoring raising concerns over the safety of millions of people and a significant share of India’s economy, according to a new report.
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, warned that the Himalayan region is approaching a dangerous threshold.
The Himalaya-Karakoram region is estimated to have around 40,000 glaciers, but only about 21 are being monitored in detail and on a sustained basis, highlighting a major gap in understanding the rapidly changing mountain environment.
As glaciers retreat, expanding lakes can form behind unstable deposits of rock and ice, increasing the threat of glacial lake outburst floods. Rising temperatures are also destabilising permafrost and high-mountain slopes, potentially triggering complex and cascading hazards downstream.
India is particularly vulnerable, with around 18 per cent of its land falling within the Himalayan region, which accounts for about 35 per cent of disasters, the report said.
A 2025 scientific assessment identified 56 glacial lakes in India as “very high risk” among 189 high-risk lakes. The Central Water Commission is monitoring 2,485 glacial lakes larger than 10 hectares across India’s Himalayan river basins.
Recent disasters underline the risks. A glacial lake outburst flood in Sikkim in 2023 killed at least 70 people and damaged roads, bridges and hydropower projects, while a similar disaster in Uttarakhand in 2021 killed more than 200 people.
The threat also extends beyond sudden floods. Himalayan rivers form a crucial water system supporting hundreds of millions of people across South Asia. “Peak water” is expected around the middle of this century in most Hindu Kush Himalayan river basins, after which glacier-fed runoff could decline as glaciers continue to lose mass.
The report estimates that Himalayan water underpins roughly 20 per cent of India’s GDP, supporting agriculture, hydropower, tea and pilgrimage-related economies. However, Himalayan states capture only about 5 per cent of the economic value generated by this water.
“The Himalayas are the Third Pole,” economist Lord Nicholas Stern said, noting that unlike the Arctic and Antarctic, “this pole has hundreds of millions of people living beneath it.”
“This is national and international infrastructure,” Stern said, warning that the ecological system supporting it is “approaching a tipping point”.
The report also identified black carbon as a significant driver of glacier loss. Around one-third of Himalayan glacier melt is estimated to be linked to black carbon, much of it originating from brick kilns in the plains. Unlike global greenhouse gas emissions, black-carbon pollution can be tackled directly by India and neighbouring countries, the report said.
“The Himalayas are approaching a tipping point, with millions of lives and livelihoods hanging in the balance,” said Arushi Chopra, Systemiq senior director and lead author. “Glaciers are melting faster than they were a decade ago.”
The report proposes 10 priority transitions, including reducing black-carbon emissions, expanding glacier monitoring, strengthening disaster early-warning systems and adopting more sustainable tourism practices.
The Indian Himalayan region receives roughly 400 million tourist visits annually. Researchers have called for a shift away from simply maximising visitor numbers towards tourism that generates greater value for local communities and reinvests it in the region.
Pema Gyamtsho, director general of ICIMOD, said the risks were becoming increasingly complex as glaciers retreat and mountain ecosystems become more unstable.
“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 hazards “do not respect national borders, and no single country can address them alone”, Gyamtsho said, stressing the need for cross-border monitoring, shared risk information, early-warning systems and joint investment in resilience.
The report said such measures are essential not only to save lives but also to protect the livelihoods and economies of hundreds of millions of people dependent on the Himalayan water system.
