This publication presents 15 case studies solicited by ICIMOD during the International Year of Biodiversity 2010. ICIMOD called for case studies from the Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region on initiatives dealing with mountain biodiversity, with a focus on success stories. Twenty-eight case studies were received from most countries in the region. Based on criteria such as content, relevance, and analysis, a panel of ICIMOD experts selected the 15 studies herein for publication, awarding prizes to four of them as well as one 'special mention'.

India started exporting a small amount of honey in 1991-1992 and has now established itself as an important honey exporter to the world market. The quantity exported has increased substantially, and today India exports honey to 62 countries, including Germany, Saudi Arabia, the United States, and the United Kingdom. This publication documents studies on the policy and processes that enabled India to export honey to the international market. It shows how India has adopted the policies, processes, standards, and guidelines of the Codex Alimentarius and the European Directive on honey.

This study focuses on the role of policies and institutions in strengthening or weakening such community adaptation strategies. It examines four key themes that emerged from the findings of the earlier study: local water governance, flood mitigation measures, agricultural diversification, and alternative livelihood options. The findings of this study will provide key pointers for future policy discourse.

This study investigates the effects of climate and socioeconomic change on the livelihoods of mountain people in the Hindu-Kush Himalayan (HKH) region, causes of vulnerability, and the ways people's cope with and adapt to change, with the overall aim of contributing to enhancing the resilience of vulnerable mountain communities.

The first comprehensive status report of snow cover in the Hindu Kush-Himalayan (HKH) region. It analyses information from ICIMOD’s regional snow cover monitoring scheme, which is compiled in a database containing snow cover data for the whole region from 2000 to the present, updated weekly.

This report synthesises the present knowledge about the consequences that climate change can have for the Hindu

This report provides a comprehensive account of the glacier coverage of the entire Hindu Kush-Himalayan region based on a standardised analysis of satellite images over a limited time frame. The report and the database serve as a significant step in filling the gap in information on the glaciers of the Hindu Kush-Himalayan region. The data analyses are presented in terms of the major river basins: Amu Darya, Brahmaputra, Ganges, Indus, Irrawaddy, Mekong, Salween, Tarim, Yangtze, and Yellow, and the large Himalayan interior basin.

The United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD or Rio+20) to be held in June 2012 will have green economy as one of its two main themes. This paper has been prepared to strengthen arguments for discussing mountain issues at Rio+20 and in other global discourses. The aim is to ensure renewed efforts and commitment by the global community at Rio+20 to prioritise mountain issues in development agendas and processes dealing with poverty reduction, food security, climate change, and other issues that are critical to sustainable development in mountain areas.

In this report, the determinants of economic poverty in mountain areas are analysed using nationally representative livelihood data at the household level. Economic poverty has a central position, because it is perceived to be at the very core of the poverty definition: the inability to fulfil basic needs. Other poverty dimensions, for example a lack of basic facilities and lack of education, are included in the form of predictors of economic poverty, together with other socioeconomic indicators.

The Kailash Sacred Landscape Conservation Initiative (KSLCI) aims to initiate and promote transboundary biodiversity and cultural conservation, ecosystem management, sustainable development, and climate change adaptation within the Kailash Sacred Landscape (KSL).