Meet Tundup Angmo, a native from the highlands of Ladakh, India’s most northern state.
Tundup has been working with GERES for one year and a half on climate change awareness and capacity building issues. She does lectures for school students and communities, designs awareness tools and conducts studies to assess the impacts of this work. Her job also encompasses advocacy on energy and environmental issues at the state and district level.
It is an encounter with a local figure deeply involved with in developmental issues, Mr Wangchuk, that made her want to get involved in energy and developmental issues. She felt the urge to contribute to the local society, an opportunity that was given to her by GERES, which has had a mission in Ladakh for more than 5 years. Her work with GERES led her to meet people from Cambodia, Africa or France. Tundup particularly appreciates to be able to share ideas with her GERES colleagues from other countries on the potential transfer of local solutions to other parts of the world.
In Ladakh, climate change is sadly becoming a fact acknowledged by the inhabitants, who can’t help notice the decline of their glaciers and their harsh consequences on the lack of water (the local agriculture being totally dependent on the glaciers for irrigation). But when doing her work, people often object that they are not the cause of the problem, and awareness raising is not relevant to them, says Tundup. Indeed, Ladakhi people live an almost zero carbon emission lifestyle, so why should they bother with climate change mitigation?
Tundup’s response is to show them the co-benefits of the practices she advocates. Major co-benefits are found in the solar passive housing project conducted by GERES in the region. This affordable energy-efficient building system allows raising the temperatures from -20 to -5 Celcius degrees inside the house at night, thus leading to major cuts in fuel expenditures, and an healthier and cleaner environment (by limiting indoor air pollution).
At COP 15: improve advocacy on mountains vulnerability to climate change.
Last year, Tundup already was in Poznan for COP 14, where she noticed the vulnerability of the Himalayan mountain range to the effects of climate change was a poorly covered issue, both by NGOs and the media, let alone in the global negotiations. A striking fact, since mountains are among the ecosystems most affected by climate change.
Along with Vincent Stauffer, director of the GERES mission in Ladakh, and Chewang Norphel, a specialist of artificial glaciers from Nepal, she decided to organize a side-event this year, to shed light on the vulnerability of the Himalayas and the Ganga basin. The side-event focuses on adaptation practices, one of the most critical issues to deal with, according to Tundup, since grave impacts are already happening in these regions.
Let’s hope, with Tundup, that significant advances come out of the negotiations on the financing of adaptation for LDCs.
Nicolas Deburge for GERES
