The Government of Nepal is contemplating shifting the base camp of Mount Everest as global warming and human activity are making the current location unsafe.
Key Highlights
- The current base camp is situated on the rapidly thinning Khumbu glacier. A new site is to be found at a lower altitude, where there is no year-round ice.
- The Khumbu glacier is rapidly melting and thinning in the wake of global warming, scientists have found.
- A study by researchers from Leeds University in 2018 showed that the segment close to base camp was thinning at a rate of 1m per year.
- Glaciers in the Himalayas make a significant contribution to water resources for millions of people in South Asia.
- In February 2022, researchers in Nepal warned that the highest glacier on the top of Mount Everest could disappear by the middle of this century as the 2,000-year-old ice cap on the world’s tallest mountain is thinning at an alarming rate.
- The International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) had said that Everest has been losing ice significantly since the late 1990s, citing a latest research report.
About International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD)
- The International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD) is an intergovernmental knowledge and learning centre that develops and shares research, information, and innovations to empower people in the eight regional member countries of the HKH (Hindukush Himalaya) – Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, India, Myanmar, Nepal, and Pakistan.
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