The Melting Cryosphere and Food & Water Security, with Randall Ritzema, Tika Gurung, and Nick Brozović

A 2023 report called Water, ice, society, and ecosystems in the Hindu Kush Himalaya: An Outlook (HI-WISE), published by the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development (ICIMOD), was an urgent call for how disappearing snow and ice in the Hindu Kush Himalayas will impact water resources for nearly two billion people. 

But the cryosphere exists elsewhere, too, as part of the globe’s hydrological system. Populations and ecosystems of The Andes, California and Nebraska, for example, all rely on a healthy cryosphere for water. With a changing climate, what are the implications to food and water security? How do we adapt? 

In this episode, DWFI Communications Specialist Arianna Elnes discusses the changing cryosphere with DWFI Research Program Scientist Randall Ritzema, who contributed to Chapter Three of the HI-WISE report; University of Nebraska-Lincoln Graduate Student of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences Tika Gurung, who studies glaciers in the Himalayas; and DWFI Director of Policy Nick Brozović.

Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute is co-hosting a webinar on the Water-Food Nexus in Mountain Systems on Wednesday, Jan. 24, 2024 at 3-4 P.M. UTC (9-10 A.M. CT). The link to register, and the recording after, is available at go.unl.edu/waterfoodnexus. 

For more on Water for Food’s work visit waterforfood.nebraska.edu