Context: Recently,the ninth edition of the Sustainable Mountain Development Summit (SMDS) commenced in Dehradun. This year, the summit was held under the following theme

• Theme: Emerging Pathways for Building Resilient Post COVID-19 Mountain Economy, Adoption, Innovation and Acceleration.

About the Summit

• The focus of the summit was on building pathways toward a resilient and sustainable mountain economy in the context of a post-COVID-19 scenario and Climate Change.
• The summit was organised by Indian Mountain Initiative. 
• The summit aimed to deliberate on issues such as water security, migration, climate resilience and innovative solutions for disaster risk reduction and farm sector in the Indian Himalayas. 
• The first edition of the summit was launched in 2011 in Nainital.

Mountain Ecosystems in India and their significance

• Himalayas are the major mountain ecosystem in India. 
• Himalayas is one of the thirty-six world biodiversity hotspots. The report International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development says that the region encompassing Hindu Kush Himalayas holds more than 240 million people. 
• It also says that more than 1.9 billion people depend on the Hindukush Himalayan region for food, water and energy. 
• The region is also called “The Third Pole” as it stores more snow and ice as compared to any other region in the world.  
• Above all, more than 25% of world population are directly or indirectly dependent on Hindukush Himalayan region. Therefore, it is essential to conserve these mountains.

Third pole and climate change

• Climate Change has become the major concern to the third pole. The climate change has directly impacted the river systems and their basins. 
• This has in turn impacted the wellbeing of millions of people. The rate of warming in the third pole region is higher than the global average.

Note: The region that encompasses the Himalaya-Hindu Kush mountain range and the Tibetan Plateau is widely known as the Third Pole because its ice fields contain the largest reserve of fresh water outside the polar regions.