Every mountain range around the world has its own characteristics and feature. They all host a unique environment, which is embedded in a complex natural system. Mountain ranges are also confronted with various threats of which climate change is now perhaps the most sobering. Mountain ecosystems are emerging as highly sensitive such that even small impacts can have profound implications on their ecology and economically-important nature-based services. Researchers from a wide range of disciplines are striving to understand these relationships mindful that climate change is set to make the sustainable management of ecosystems ever more complex. UNEP, though its office in Vienna, is the global Environmental Reference Centre (ERC) of the Mountain Partnership and actively works to factor environmental sustainability into the initiative’s strategic planning and activities.
The ERC’s role is to assist access by the Mountain Partnership to UNEP’s expertise in the six thematic priorities of its Medium Term Strategy including climate change. UN General Assembly Resolution 62/196 requested “the scientific community, national governments and inter-governmental organisation to collaborate with mountain communities to jointly study and address the negative effects of global climate change on mountain environments.” In response to this call for action, UNEP promoted and organised the conference on “Mountains as Early Indicators for Climate Change” in order to exchange state-of-the art research on climate change and mountains and to evolve understanding on the ecosystem services they provide to the globe not least water.
The outcomes of the conference are presented in this publication. They underline the acute vulnerability of mountains in a climate constrained world and the urgent need for coordinated and concrete adaptation strategies if they are to continue to contribute to achieving, for example, the UN’s Millennium Development Goals Points that more than 190 nations must take on board when they meet at the crucial UN climate convention meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark later this year to Seal the Deal on a compressive, equitable and scientifically-credible new agreement.
