Save the world’s glaciers to save the planet: UN

GENEVA: Saving the world´s shrinking glaciers is a “survival strategy” for the planet, the UN said on Tuesday, a day after President Donald Trump announced the US would withdraw from the Paris climate accord.

United Nations agencies launched an appeal to scale up efforts to rescue the world´s 275,000 glaciers, which are rapidly melting away as the planet warms. The UN´s educational, scientific and cultural agency Unesco, and its World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) weather, climate and water agency, pointed to the essential role these giant ice masses play, providing fresh water to more than two billion people globally.

“The preservation of glaciers is essential for our ecosystems, our economies and our planetary health,” the WMO´s deputy chief Ko Barrett said as the agencies launched the International Year of Glaciers´ Preservation.

“Urgent and sustained reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are vital,” she told the gathering in Geneva. “But unfortunately we are heading in the wrong direction as levels of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping greenhouse gases continue to rise.”

The world´s glaciers currently cover approximately 700,000 square kilometres. Glaciers and ice sheets play a crucial role in regulating the global climate and store approximately 70 percent of the world´s fresh water, which is essential for billions of people, the agencies said.