Photo by forseti.is

Icelandic President, Ólafur Ragnar Grímsson, has said that greater cooperation is needed between Iceland and the Himalayan region in South Asia, as Bhutan begins to feel the effects of climate change, reports RÚV.

“There is mounting evidence of how the retreating glaciers will impact the rivers and the water systems in the Himalayan countries,” said the president during his visit to Bhutan yesterday. “As in the Arctic, the ecosystems of the Himalayas are particularly sensitive to climate change; the number of people affected being, of course, far greater; indeed the potential transformation of the great Asian rivers would influence the fate of hundreds of millions of people. Furthermore, what happens to the glaciers and the ice in the Himalayas and the Arctic has profound consequences for weather patterns and climate on other continents”

As reported, the ice of Iceland is melting rapidly, causing the land to rebound from the Earth’s crust and intensifying the risk of an increase in volcanic eruptions.

Worryingly, this change is happening much faster than previous research suggested. If melting continues at its current pace, by around 2025, some parts of Iceland will be rising at a rate of 1.6 inches a year.