South Asian lawmakers call for stronger regional climate cooperation

South Asian lawmakers want the region to stop treating climate cooperation as a collection of agreements and start building systems that work across borders.

Representatives from Nepal, India, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Bangladesh made the call at a two-day parliamentary dialogue in Thimphu that ended Sunday. The September 5-6 meeting brought together lawmakers, officials and technical experts under the South Asia Regional Parliamentary Forum for Climate, Energy and Environment, hosted by Bhutan’s National Assembly.

The proposals followed a devastating glacial-related disaster in Nepal, which the source said had killed at least 1,355 people and left nearly 5,000 missing. Participants said the disaster showed the shared risks facing countries connected by vulnerable Himalayan ecosystems.

The forum said it would explore a South Asia Climate Cooperation Council to keep political attention on climate, energy and the environment. The proposed council would link existing initiatives to implementation without duplicating SAARC, BIMSTEC, BBIN or SACEP. Lawmakers also backed work toward a regional electricity grid, pointing to complementary energy resources. Nepal has an estimated 42,000 megawatts of hydropower potential, Bhutan has more than 30,000 megawatts of technically feasible potential, and India has more than 253,000 megawatts of installed renewable capacity.

Another proposal would establish regional disaster-preparedness and data-sharing arrangements, including shared early-warning systems, monitoring of glacial lakes and floods across Himalayan basins, and cross-border climate-risk data. SARPF leaders and UNOPS chief climate officer Samantha Stratton-Short called for stronger early-warning arrangements and information sharing. Parliamentarians asked SARPF to develop a possible blueprint for the council and pursue the proposals with regional and international institutions.