Melting Glaciers
Threaten
World Water Supply
By Ed Cropley
19 November, 2004
Planet
Ark
Mountain
glaciers, which act as the world's water towers, are shrinking at ever
faster rates, threatening the livelihoods of millions of people and
the future of countless species, a scientist said Thursday.
Around 75 percent
of the world's fresh water is stored in glacial ice, much of it in mountain
areas, allowing for heavy winter rain and snow-falls to be released
gradually into river networks throughout summer or dry months.
"For some species and some people there are going to be big problems
because mountain areas feed not just rural people but big cities, especially
in Latin America," said Martin Price of the UK-based Center for
Mountain Studies.
In dry countries,
mountain glaciers can account for as much as 95 percent of water in
river networks, while even in lowland areas of temperate countries such
as Germany, around 40 percent of water comes from mountain ice-fields,
Price said.
"It's a huge
issue in the long run because once the glaciers go, you're down to whatever
happens to fall out of the sky and come downstream," Price told
Reuters on the sidelines of the IUCN World Conservation Congress in
the Thai capital.
Due to factors such
as global warming and air pollution, glaciers, like the polar ice caps,
are getting smaller.
Studies show that
Africa's highest peak, Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, may lose its ice-cap
by 2020, while the Glacier National Park in the northern United States
could well be looking for a new name by 2030.
As well as threatening
consistent, year-round water flows, climate change in mountains is threatening
the vast variety of species.
Animals and plants
in mountain areas, which officially cover 25 percent of the earth's
surface, are under threat from the gradually changing climate, as well
as loss of habitat on lower reaches which is pushing species to ever
higher altitudes.
Eventually, they
will run out of places to go.
"What can you
do about it? You just have to try and adapt as things go along. You
have to be as flexible as possible, but a lot of species are going to
go extinct. In mountain areas many already have," Price said.