PARIS, March 18 (Xinhua) -- The UNESCO on Wednesday launched the Decade of Action for Cryospheric Sciences (DACS) at its headquarters in Paris, with the aim of strengthening research, monitoring, education and public action in response to cryospheric change.

According to the UNESCO, the cryosphere, including glaciers, ice sheets, permafrost, sea ice and snow, holds around 70 percent of the Earth's freshwater, but is shrinking rapidly. Its loss is already affecting water security, ecosystems, infrastructure and disaster risks worldwide.

"Cryosphere loss is not just about water security. It is also about mass migration, agriculture, infrastructure and geopolitical issues," French glaciologist Heidi Sevestre said during a panel on the DACS.

The decade therefore needs an explicit strategy to bring these issues into security forums, finance conferences, health conferences and geopolitical summits, Sevestre added.

"The region of the 'Third Pole,' where China is located, is one of the most crucial, most urgent and most globally consequential areas in terms of cryospheric change. In this context, international cooperation is indispensable for cryosphere research," Yao Tandong, member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told Xinhua.

China has already accumulated valuable experience in international cooperation in research on the Third Pole, which is of great significance for the future implementation of the Decade, Yao said.

For John Pomeroy, chair of the Ad Hoc Management Committee of the DACS, the resolution of current cryospheric models remains too coarse for mountain regions, while the representation of processes in polar areas is still inadequate.

In his view, next-generation models should be co-developed with local communities, feature high resolution, offer genuine scalability, and be closely integrated with observation systems. ■