Summiteers' Summit To Save the Himalayas

On the 4th of December, 2009, Nepal's top politicians followed in the footsteps of the Maldives' underwater cabinet meeting by strapping on oxygen tanks to highlight the dangers of Global Warming. Unlike the Maldives' meeting, however, this one was not held 20 feet (6m) below water, but 17,192 feet (5,250 meters) above it, in the thin air of Mount Everest.

The Himalayas sprawl about 2,700 km across Pakistan, India, Nepal, China, and Bhutan. The Himalaya regulates the climate in India and Tibetan by creating a barrier against the cold, dry Arctic wind from the north and for the warm monsoon winds in the south.

The Himalaya contains the greatest area of glaciers - about 15,000 of them - and permafrost outside the polar area. Feeding the ten largest rivers of Asia, the Himalaya is the main water tower of Asia. Together, these ten rivers provide the livelihood of about 1.3 billion people. The Himalaya possesses an abundance of ecological niches, ranging from subtropical to arctic climates, supporting an enormous diversity of flora and fauna. (source : Climate for Life)

There are 3,250 glaciers in the Nepalese Himalayas, and 2,315 of them contain glacial lakes that are increasing in size at varying rates and might burst out of their seams at any moment. The disappearance of glaciers also means that the rivers fed by the glaciers may run dry in the near future. (source : BBC). Added to this that the reduction of reflective (white) area will also cause an exponential increase in heat, reflecting less and less rays over time... 

To highlight the dangers Global Warming poses to glaciers, Nepal's government - with the help of Green Ventures and the Everest Summiteers Association - held a Cabinet meeting at folding tables next to the Everest base camp at Kalapathar at an altitude of 17,192ft (5,250 metres). In the World's Highest Cabinet meeting a commitment was signed to tighten environmental regulations and expand the nation's protected areas.

"The Everest declaration was a message to the world to minimize the negative impact of climate change on Mount Everest and other Himalayan mountains," Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal later said.

The Prime Minister, his two deputy prime ministers and the 20 Cabinet ministers were examined by doctors before boarding helicopters to Kalapathar, a flat area at an altitude of 17,192 feet (5,250 meters) next to Everest base camp, the jumping point for climbers seeking to scale the peak.

Considering the health, age and experience of the ministers (most of them came from the low-lying plains in the south of Nepal, several were overweight and some were over 70 years old) the Cabinet only spent 20 minutes on to the mountain to prevent any of the ministers, unused to the heights of the Himalayas, from getting altitude sickness. Four ministers declined to attend either because of health concerns or because they were travelling abroad.

The Nepalese government presented Green Ventures
with a certificate of appreciation to thank them for their support & sponsorship.

A week later, a second Summiteer's Summit was held, this time in Copenhagen at the Conference on Climate Change. There, the Nepalese government repeated its plea for the Himalayas and for the need of decisive action against climate change