World Day for Glaciers
March, 2025
World Day for Glaciers is celebrated on 21 March, to go along with the International Year of Glaciers’ Preservation this year.
Glaciers are vital to the health of rivers that emerge from the high Himalayan range. These rivers account for close to a fifth of the Earth's fresh water stock. However, there are concerns over the shrinking of glaciers attributed largely to human-induced climate change.
The impact of shrinking glaciers is felt most acutely by farmers in the Himalaya as water from glacial melts needed for their first irrigation arrives late. This pushes the farming window further away, risking damage to their standing crop. People of Ladakh have been carrying out novel experiments to build ice structures to tackle this challenge. The idea is to freeze water in winter and use it in early spring.
Acres of Ice, a newly set up Ladakhi company, is working by combining multiple design philosophies and introducing automation, to build automated ice reservoirs. Check out our new story on this latest development in Ladakh.
Ladakh is not new to such ideas. People of Ladakh have been building ice structures to counter the challenge of water shortage in spring. Such initiatives began in the 1990s in the form of artificial glaciers designed by Chewang Norphel. An artificial glacier is a horizontal ice sheet that this developed by building small bunds to dam and freeze water on north-facing slopes, away from the village. Most of this work would happen in later autumn and winter, which meant working in severely cold conditions.
Later in 2013, Sonam Wangchuk conceived the construction of vertical ice stupas. These structures could be built much closer to the village, which made it possible for many more villages to test this idea out. Wangchuk was also able to get the local youth excited and involved in building these ice stupas. Village-level competitions at building large ice stupas are still held across Ladakh.
While these efforts may seem like a snowflake of hope in an avalanche of uncertainties, it is heartening to see the energy and entrepreneurial spirit of the youth at facing these challenges head-on.
As spring slowly creeps onto the high mountains, we have two stories on how women spend time in the winters
Wool, Winter and Women
Shawls of Spiti
We leave you with a story where wool itself becomes the storyteller. The film weaves together art, music, and storytelling to reignite our connection with a vanishing way of pastoral life. This film was created by Studio Eeksaurus is collaboration with the Centre for Pastoralism for the deccan edition of the exhibition 'Living Lightly - Journeys with Pastoralists'.
That’s all for this edition. Until next time..
Photo credits: Acres of Ice, Leh Nutrition Project, The Ice Stupa Project and Vasantha Yoganathan for the New Yorker
Illustrations: Nawang Tankhe