The post Tibet Digest March 2024 appeared first on fnvaworld.org.

This podcast focuses on the climate emergency and the critical ‘India China Tibet
Triangle’. Tenzin Choekyi and Lobsang Yangtso were part of an all-female, mostly Tibetan
team who spoke for Tibet at the most important meeting for the future of our planet, the
United Nations Climate Change Conference COP27, held in Egypt from 6-20 November.
Tenzin Choekyi and Lobsang Yangtso also spoke of experiences on the frontline and
dwelled on the surveillance of civil society groups at COP27 in Sharm El Sheik.

Lobsang Yangtso shared her experiences at the recently concluded COP27 in the Podcast
discussion, and said that Tibet is one of the front lines of the global climate crisis and it’s
warming nearly three times faster than the rest of the earth. Like the Arctic, Tibet is
experiencing profound climate change impacts. China’s hydro-damming and mineral
extraction in Tibet, combined with climate change, threaten to destroy Tibet’s unique
ecosystems. She also shared her serious observations of the lack of participation from a
Tibetan from Tibet at COP27 to discuss such issues saying “Tibetan people are not on the
global climate discussion because of colonialism, because of Chinese occupation of Tibet”.
She suggested that the COP meetings in future should have space for stateless people –
people under occupation –who can come to the table to contribute in terms of adaptation
and mitigation measures.

In this discussion Tenzin Choekyi speaks on how zero COVID and climate change are
directly related to food security and nomad displacement – the policies have created
tremendous difficulty and are making nomads lose their food security. She further
emphasised on the Tibetan Environmental Defenders and how the Chinese regime has been
purging them in the name of ‘A Threat to National Security’. Tenzin Choekyi in particular
focused on the late Kunchok Jinpa who was arbitrarily sentenced and passed away in
Chinese prison.

Gabriel Lafitte highlighted China’s role in COP27 and the climate debate. That solidarity
and clarity of purpose of all the developing countries succeeded in getting the entire EU to
change quite radically their policy, and to concede that they really do need to come up with
the finances to enable the world to survive climate change, and that put tremendous
pressure on the United States. That then left a really big question about China – which is
adamant and explicit that it is in no way obligated to pay for loss and damage.

Gabriel then explains why Tibet matters to the rest of the world because Tibet governs the
flow of the monsoon rains and creates the rivers that are sourced from Tibet. The rapid
heating of the Tibetan plateau drives the monsoons.

“In Tibet, China sees an abundant source of hydro power, solar power, wind power, oil and
gas, all to be exported to the heavy industrial users of lowland China. In Tibet the climate is
warming faster than most, as the jet stream in the upper atmosphere diverts around the
plateau, which is such a massive island in the sky that it affects even the jet stream.

Globally, the increasingly common droughts, forest fires, also extreme downpours and
floods are intensified by the increasing meandering of the jet stream. Yet China sees only a
payoff, a dividend it collects as the Tibetan Plateau gets wetter and warmer, its glaciers
melt, the great rivers of Tibet increase streamflow, and China benefits.”

Tibet has a rich diversity of plants and animals, particularly in the warmer, wetter, rugged
landscapes of eastern Tibet, Kham, a big area currently split into no less than four Chinese
provinces. Although Kham has long been recognised as one of the planet’s biodiversity
“hotspots”, very little of it is protected, and some landscapes that are officially protected
such as the UNESCO World Heritage Three Parallel Rivers in Yunnan are mapped by
China to exclude the actual rivers, allowing them to be dammed for hydropower.

Tenzin Choekyi concludes with a passionate message from the Dalai Lama about protecting
all living beings, saying as soon as he wakes in the morning His Holiness recites and
reminds himself of the practice of compassion through the Shantideva prayer, which
includes the lines: ‘As long as space endures, as long as living beings remain, may I too
remain to dispel the misery of the world.’ He puts that into practice. We need the vision
that it is not only human beings [who matter], it is every living being.

The post Tibet in Context: Climate Change in Tibet: What you need to Know! appeared first on fnvaworld.org.

One of the biggest challenges facing China’s future development is water, which must support the country’s 1.4 billion people and booming industries. Despite being one of the top five countries with the largest freshwater resources, on a per capita basis, China faces serious water shortages which are further compounded by a highly uneven spatial distribution and precipitation: the densely populated north suffers from acute water shortages whereas the south is prone to severe floods. To optimize the allocation of water resources, China has embarked on the construction of a mega engineering project, the South North Water Diversion project (SNWD).

Expanding the world’s largest water transfer project

The project was first proposed in 1952 by Mao Zedong who concluded that “the south has plenty of water, the north much less. If possible, the north should borrow a little.” And the SNWD does exactly that — it diverts water from the South to the North along three routes: eastern, middle, and western. The eastern route transfers water through Jiangsu to Shandong and Tianjin via the Beijing-Hangzhou Grand Canal, which dates back to nearly 2,500 years ago. The middle route, diverting water from Hubei province to Beijing and Tianjin, has been in use since 2014.

The western, and most controversial route, has not yet been built. In May 2021, Chinese President Xi Jinping announced that China will press ahead with the world’s largest water diversion project. The western route’s plans are split into two categories: modest plans from the government and ambitious proposals from scholars.

Various plans for the western route

The official plan for the western route links the Yangtze and Yellow rivers across the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau to divert 17 billion m3 of water, approximately 7 million Olympic-sized swimming pools, to Gansu and neighbouring provinces each year. This transfer is massive, but notably much smaller than two alternate water transfer plans  targeting water from the Qinghai-Tibetan plateau. 

The Shuotian Canal (Great Western Route) was an earlier proposal by water expert Guo Kai in the 1990s. By building a dam in Tibet, 200 billion m3 of water could be diverted from Sichuan to Beijing and Tianjin. It was later concluded that the Shuotian Canal is neither technically feasible nor necessary.

Another proposal from 2017 on the Red Flag River was introduced by Tsinghua professor Wang Hao. It plans to annually divert 60 billion m3 of water from transboundary rivers on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau, including the upstream of the Brahmaputra, Mekong, and Salween, to northwest China. This would create 200 million mu (133,333 km2) of arable land in Xinjiang and a 150,000km2 greenbelt in the northwest. However, its feasibility has been questioned by academics and geographers.

As a possible alternative to the western route, the Tianhe project, the world’s largest weather modification and artificial rainmaking system, was proposed by scientists from Tsinghua and Qinghai universities in 2015. The Tianhe project uses glaciogenic cloud seeding to annually create 5-10 billion m3 of rain above northern China. It was included in Qinghai’s 13th Five Year Plan. 

National food security driver and environmental concerns

The western route is needed to safeguard the country’s water and food security while balancing regional economic development. As Xi Jinping stated in 2014, the lifeline of food production lies in the country’s water conservancy systems. Aside from grappling with national water quality, quantity, and unequal distribution, China faces a lack of arable land: estimates suggest that only 14 percent of the country’s total land is arable. With the remainder heavily contaminated by pollutants, this aggravates water scarcity, food safety, and food security concerns. Due to a changing dietary landscape, including increased demand for water-intensive produce like meat, these challenges will continue to increase. Hence, to the Chinese leaders, the western route could solve northern China’s water shortage problems and protect China’s overall food security.

Social and ecological concerns raised by environmentalists and scientists have delayed the construction of the western route. As both the Shuotian Canal and Red Flag River would need to cross earthquake-prone areas and mountain ranges, there are fears that they could result in seismic and environmental consequences such as landslides.

Competing local interests

Unlike the central government, provincial governments are less concerned about equity of access to resources. On the one hand, southern provinces from where water will be transferred, particularly Sichuan and Hubei provinces, which are located at the Yangtze River’s upstream, strongly oppose the western route. Not only does diverting water from these provinces threaten their own water supply, leading to fears of water scarcity and droughts, but it would additionally undermine the local hydropower sectors. In Sichuan, home to China’s largest hydropower sector, governments have publicly supported local scientists who strongly dispute the western route’s feasibility.

On the other hand, western provinces, such as Gansu and Qinghai, support the western route. They believe it will encourage regional socio-economic development by providing water for local industries, coal, and agriculture. Given their huge water demand, western provinces prefer the ambitious unofficial proposals. For example, the Gansu provincial government has provided support for  research on various options to divert waters from Tibet (the Brahmaputra River) to Gansu.

International implications

India has long worried over China’s plans to divert the Brahmaputra, fearing it could cause water shortages. This is, however, a misperception: the official western route plans to divert waters from the Yangtze and Yellow rivers, not from transnational rivers like the Brahmaputra. Additionally, these unofficial proposals are not being seriously considered by the central government.

Furthermore, there is no consensus on the actual impacts from the plans on the downstream region’s water supply. To some Indian scholars, China’s water ambitions and perceived weaponization of water have caused alarm. As little as seven percent of the Brahmaputra’s flow comes from China, so even if the radical Shuotian Canal and Red Flag River are constructed, the actual impacts on water flows downstream will be limited.

Nevertheless, the strategic implications of these projects should not be overlooked. To some, the potential ability to manipulate the water flows could provide China strategic leverage over India.

An alternative route for water supply

Rather than relying on these mega projects to address national water challenges, China should reduce rising water demand, improve water use efficiency, and tackle water pollution. Given agricultural water demand accounts for most of the country’s water usage, China should balance water and food security, and consider undertaking regional and structural reforms to its agricultural sector.

The post To Build or Not to Build: Western Route of China’s South-North Water Diversion Project appeared first on fnvaworld.org.

In today’s hydro-diplomatic realities, transboundary Rivers have obvious political significance either as a source of cooperation or as a cause of tension among riparian states. If any country attempts to act unilaterally in a common basin, hydrological interdependence causes discord. 

The Yarlung Zangbo better known as Brahmaputra River Basin (BRB), which is shared by four countries: China (50.5%), India (33.6%), Bangladesh (8.1%), and Bhutan (7.8%), provides life-supporting services to over 80 million people, including more than 200 indigenous multi-ethnic tribes.

Due to complex hydro-political setup as well as adverse impact of climate change, Water diplomacy on the Brahmaputra river would become much more complicated in the future. In addition to that, As China, India and Bangladesh continue to grow demographically, economically as well as with increased industrial consumption it is apparent that countries will face water scarcity than ever before which will further deteriorate the already worse situation.

Of the basin stakeholders Bangladesh is critically reliant (about 91%) on external sources for water and at least 60% of Its population relies on the Brahmaputra’s catchment basin. The river delivers over 65% of the country’s river water each year.

India’s concern is that Chinese hydro-project activities near politically contentious Arunachal Pradesh could firm up China’s claim over the region what China regards as ‘southern Tibet. Moreover, India is currently in a water-stressed situation with per capita water availability of 1,545 cubic meters in a year (population census -2011) and is going to face a severe water-scarce challenge in near future.

China, which has about 20% of the world’s population, has only 7% of the world’s fresh water resources, with 80 percent of the water being in southern China. Water scarcity is a national threat as a result of this uneven distribution. In such a confrontational scenario, it’s highly unlikely that the countries will make any compromises on their water demands in the Brahmaputra river, rather they will take a very conservative stance in any water negotiation. so, this is not surprising that, the riparian states’ competition for control over water flows will escalate and eventually a conflictual situation will emerge in this front.

On July 1 the Chinese Communist Party’s 100th anniversary celebration with the achievement of building a 16,000 MW Baihetan Dam (World’s 2nd biggest) posed a grave concern for India because The National People’s Congress (NPC), China’s Top legislative body has adopted a new Five-Year Plan (2021-25) that gives green signal to the construction of a 60-gigawatt Mega-hydropower plant at Medog, close to Arunachal.

Though China continues to assure India and Bangladesh that It’s planned hydro- project is based on run-of- river (RoR), which do not involve storage or diversion, India, its Asian rival remained concerned that such large-scale Chinese projects will ‘choke off’ the flow of the Brahmaputra and trigger flash floods or create water scarcity in northeast India in times of Sino-India conflict.

Bangladesh worries about this but it’s more complex and proximate concern is India’s projected 10-GW hydropower dam with a large water storage capacity which would likely divert water from the river. There is a speculation that Indian dam will have a direct significant effect on Bangladesh as lion’s share of the Brahmaputra sourced within Indian borders and only 30 to 40% comes from Tibet.

Besides, regarding water security, Bangladesh’s threat perceptions emanate from Delhi’s Brahmaputra tributary diversions through the River-Linking Project (RLP), Specifically Manas-Sankosh-Tista-Ganga (MSTG) Link and controversial use of River resources through Farakka and Gazaldoba Barrage on Ganga and Teesta respectively.

However, water experts and environmentalists indicate that The combined hydro-projects of China and India might have a wide range of socio-economic and environmental repercussions on Bangladesh. Because these projects have the potential to hold back massive amount of silt, deteriorate water quality, diminish ground water level, restrict navigation, Increase river salinity ultimately threaten economic livelihood. More importantly, in case of heavy rain in upstream, Floods and other water-related hazards will wreak havoc on Bangladesh, which is prone to flooding across 80% of its land area.

In a nutshell, if China builds a dam upstream, India will be alarmed. Similarly, if both India and China proceed with such dam projects, Bangladesh will definitely be concerned.

Considering all the hydro-political aspects, riparian Countries should explore the scope of benefit-sharing cooperation approach that might produce a positive-sum outcome by optimizing available benefits and equitably sharing them in order to achieve a win-win solution. The shared vision of achieving food security, sustainable economic growth and access to cost-efficient electricity can bring four riparian countries under the same umbrella to Cooperate with each other.

India can jointly work with Bangladesh to connect its National Waterway-2 with its National Waterway-1 which will give India the much-needed access to its north-eastern provinces cost-effectively and safely. Bhutan, the land-locked country of the basin can find immense opportunity to increase its international commerce and trade through the network of rivers. Multipurpose storage dams in China or India would have multiple benefits since they have immense potential to generate hydroelectricity, that can be distributed regionally via regional grid connectivity.

Apart from economic benefits, Joint investment, collective management and co-ownership of resources can create long awaited regional economic integration easing political tensions like the Senegal and the Columbia River basin countries.

So, in addition to state-level diplomacy, countries need to promote track-II and track-III diplomacy to establish a River Basin Commission under which they will seek to identify basket of benefits in the areas of water supply, Hydro-power plants and multi-purpose storage dam, energy production, water navigation, flood control, fisheries, tourism and so on. Platform like BCIM or SAARC can be a viable option for fostering negotiation.

In South Asia, The Permanent Indus Commission is a glaring example of river cooperation, which has managed to survive even after three wars, a number of military stand-offs and several other episodes of political friction since 1960 between the two nuclear rivals: India and Pakistan.

So, it is expected that India and China, the two biggest geopolitical forces in the region would not stick to zero-sum dilemma by engaging a hydro-power race in the Brahmaputra, rather they would consider adaptive hydro-diplomacy to form a “Brahmaputra Basin Commission.” along the lines of the Danube, Mekong, Indus, Senegal or Columbia basin Mechanism.

The post Brahmaputra Water: Why China And India Need To Give It A Fresh Look – OpEd appeared first on fnvaworld.org.