Statement on the occasion of the International Conference on Glaciers’ Preservation 2025

H.E. Mr. Emomali Rahmon, President of the Republic of Tajikistan,

Madam Deputy Secretary General, Amina Mohammed,  

Honourable Vice Presidents, Ministers, Excellencies, Colleagues, and Dear Friends,

It is a great honour to join you today at the International Conference on Glaciers’ Preservation 2025 here in Dushanbe.

I am especially grateful to H.E. Mr. Emomali Rahmon, President of the Republic of Tajikistan, for the generous hospitality extended to all of us, and for your unwavering leadership and commitment to the preservation of glaciers and our shared environment.

The World Meteorological Organization is proud to support this important conference and to co-lead the International Year of Glaciers’ Preservation along with our partners including UNESCO and the Asian Development Bank.  

It is one of the highlights of WMO’s 75th anniversary year as a UN specialized agency committed to transforming science into services and forecasts into action.

My arrival in Dushanbe this week coincided with a major glacier collapse in Switzerland, where WMO is hosted. This collapse triggered a gigantic avalanche of ice, mud and debris which buried much of the small village of Blatten in the southern Alps. Luckily nobody was killed – thanks to early warnings and evacuations. But numerous houses were destroyed. This part of Switzerland will never be the same again.

Glaciers are the foundation of community life all over the world. They sustain ecosystems, regulate water cycles, and glacier-fed systems provide drinking water and economic livelihoods for countless millions.  

Glacier melt has repercussions not just in mountain villages and valleys but also in coastal megacities thousands of kilometers away because it has become a major cause of sea level rise.  

You just heard from Amina Mohammed some of the shocking statistics – taken from WMO reports - about the sheer volume of ice which has melted in recent years: 9000 Gigatones of ice: that’s more than 30 times the volume of the Aral Sea before it began drying.

Here in Central Asia, the 28,000 glaciers of the Tien Shan and Pamir Mountains are part of the landscape. Yet, they are retreating at an alarming pace. This is a serious regional concern, as these glaciers feed major river systems.

The Van Yakh Glacier—the largest in the region—has lost approximately 16 cubic kilometers in volume and 45 square kilometers in area in recent decades. That’s the equivalent of 6.4 million Olympic swimming pools and 6,000 football fields worth of ice.  

All gone.    

Ladies and gentlemen,

Our glaciers are dying.  

Nepal recently declared the loss of Langtang’s Yala Glacier. Venezuela has become the second country in the world after Slovenia to lose all its glaciers.  

The death of a glacier means much more than the loss of ice. It is a mortal blow to our ecosystems, economies, and social fabric.  

So, what do we do? How do we reverse this trajectory?

Let me offer five urgent and practical actions we must take.

First. Tackle the root cause: global warming. We must slash greenhouse gas emissions.  2025 is the year we update our climate pledges. The next round of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC 3.0) must be ambitious. 1.5°C is not a preference—it’s a Must.

Second—Strengthen our monitoring systems. We can’t manage what we don’t measure. We need more investment in our National Hydrometeorological Services. We need more high-elevation weather stations. Better satellite coverage. And long-term, ground-based glacier tracking. We need an Earth System approach and better models.

Third—Unlock the power of partnership.  Initiatives like WMO’s Global Cryosphere Watch and Early Warnings for All are helping to bridge science and service. But to scale them, we need more data sharing, more regional collaboration, and stronger political will.

Our Third Pole Regional Climate Centre is already helping Himalayan nations build resilience—let’s expand and replicate these models.

Fourth—Turn science into policy. Data must drive decisions. Glacier and hydrological insights must shape everything from disaster risk plans to river basin management strategies. We must therefore make sure that the data is shared. It’s a question of trust. No country can manage climate risks alone. We must stand together.

And fifth—Invest in people. Let’s empower the next generation of glaciologists, hydrologists, and climate experts—especially women and young scientists. Knowledge must be sustained, shared, and passed down. For the sake of future generations.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Glaciers are not relics of the past. They are pillars of the present day. They are critical for people and prosperity and our planet. And for our future.

Our choices today will determine whether our children inherit a world with glaciers, or only memories of them.

Let this conference in Dushanbe be remembered not only for what was said, but for what was committed and achieved.

The time to act is now.

Thank you.