In run up to COP30, Stockholm Paper blames China’s expansion, resource extraction for Tibet’s extreme ecological stress
The Stockholm Centre for South Asian and Indo‑Pacific Affairs (SCSA‑IPA) released a new report this week that calls on world leaders to treat the Tibetan Plateau as a priority in climate action. The study, titled “Wither Tibet in the Climate Crisis Agenda?”, warns that the high‑altitude “Third Pole” is warming faster than most of the planet and that China’s rapid development plans are turning the fragile ecosystem into a zone of extreme stress.
Why Tibet matters
The plateau feeds nearly two billion people in South and Southeast Asia. Its glaciers and permafrost control water flows into the Ganges, Brahmaputra, Mekong and Yangtze rivers. When glaciers shrink, supplies become uneven, floods and droughts rise, and farmers, cities and energy grids feel the shock.
Scientists say the plateau’s temperature is climbing at more than twice the global rate. Grasslands are turning into barren steppe and glaciers are sliding downstream faster than ever. If the region isn’t protected, the impacts will ripple across Asia’s food, water and energy security.
What’s driving the crisis
The report blames China’s state‑centric approach to infrastructure and resource extraction. Massive highways, railways, airports and hydropower dams—many double‑use for civil and military purposes—have cracked permafrost, split alpine ecosystems and displaced local communities.
It also highlights the proposed Medog mega‑dam on the upper Brahmaputra, a $160 billion project that could trigger landslides, earthquakes and long‑term harm to downstream rivers in India and Bangladesh. China’s secrecy around environmental data makes it hard for the world to gauge the risks.
Beyond water, Tibet is turning into a hub for mining lithium, copper and rare‑earth elements that fuel green‑energy tech. The extraction is carried out with minimal environmental safeguards and the voices of Tibetans are largely ignored, a process the report calls “extractive colonialism.”
Human cost
Since 2000, close to a million Tibetans have been relocated for projects framed as ecological protection or poverty relief. Many of them have been moved several times, without fair compensation or stable jobs. The loss of cultural ties and traditional stewardship threatens the knowledge that has kept the ecosystem in balance for centuries.
Recommendations
The SCSA‑IPA calls for the plateau to be elevated to the same urgency level as the Arctic or low‑lying island nations. Its 10‑point framework urges:
- Transparent, independent monitoring using satellites and hydrology under UN or multilateral oversight.
- Development of a formal transboundary water‑governance body, such as a Brahmaputra Basin Commission.
- Tying green finance and trade to strict environmental and social safeguards.
- Inclusive participation of local communities in decision‑making.
- International pressure on the Chinese government to halt unchecked hydropower expansion.
- Strengthening of ecological research to fill data gaps.
- Establishment of pollution‑control measures for mining operations.
- Creation of resettlement funds to compensate displaced populations.
- Promotion of climate‑smart agriculture in the region.
- Public awareness campaigns across the Indo‑Pacific about the plateau’s global significance.
Looking ahead
The report comes just months before the UN’s COP30 climate conference in Brazil. It urges that Tibet’s decline should not stay a blind spot in global negotiations. The message is clear: protecting the “Roof of the World” is not only a national issue for China but an ecological imperative that could shape the climate fate of the whole continent and beyond.
Source: ianslive
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