Researchers from each of the Indus basin countries have been monitoring and analysing their country’s part of the cryosphere for many years, albeit with a large data gap for Afghanistan. As a result of limited coordination between researchers and research across borders, knowledge on the basin’s water resources is fragmented. Despite the obvious merits of cooperation among riparian countries, there has been no initiative so far aimed at developing a synoptic understanding of the Indus water system as a whole.

Therefore a program has been proposed which aims to systematically assess the historic and likely future trends of water resource availability and socio-economic impact across the entire basin and the four countries sharing the basin. This will provide policy and decision makers within the basin and beyond with the information and knowledge to support the development of evidence based climate change adaptation planning in the Indus basin.

Objective

The overarching objective of the meeting is to assess the Indus Forum research proposal and to develop a framework for integrated basin-wide water resource assessment under the changing climate in the Indus basin, incorporating all relevant processes within the basin at appropriate temporal and spatial resolutions that will enable informed decision-making about the sustainable management of Indus water resources.