By Shaurya Kshatri
Kathmandu, Aug. 8: Natural disasters are getting both worse and more frequent. This year’s wildfire season in Nepal was the most destructive in recorded history. Landslides and floods continue ravaging farmlands, sweeping away concrete bridges, destroying mega projects like Melamchi Drinking Water, and displacing millions of people. Lightning has become the all-time greatest killer among other natural calamities in Nepal. And for the first time in over 24 years, swarms of desert locusts entered Nepal in June 2020 threatening agricultural products and prompting immediate action.

According to the National Emergency Operation Centre statistics, the number of disasters—natural and manmade—has seen a significant rise nationwide in the last three years. In comparison to the last 10 years’ record of natural disasters, the highest number of human casualties were recorded last year along with the highest number of reported incidents of natural disaster. The 2020 monsoon season recorded 911 incidents of landslides and floods with 347 confirmed casualties as compared to 690 incidents and 161 deaths from 2019.

With the Nepal Disaster Risk Reduction Portal still recording about five to eight instances of both flood and landslide every week, 2021 might be another grim reminder of nature’s increasing wrath.
So what is to blame for these severe weather events and some of the worst catastrophes ever recorded in Nepal’s history?

Climate Change
A simple answer is climate change. The world is getting warmer. According to a 2020 report by the World Meteorological Organisation, the most recent decade between 2011 to 2021 has been the warmest on record. Rising temperatures have resulted in intense precipitation over short periods of time increasing instances of landslides and floods.
In Nepal’s mountainous region, glacial lakes that store huge volumes of water behind unstable moraine dams are continuously expanding with increasing temperature, explains Arun Bhakta Shrestha, Senior Climate Change Specialist. The country has over 20 potentially dangerous glacial lakes susceptible to outburst. Shrestha, who was part of the ICIMOD’s Disaster Task Force, also attributed snowmelt and erosion of glacial deposits as possible reasons for the recent Melamchi flood disaster.

Instances of global warming have resulted in erratic weather patterns across the country. Dubbed as the Himalayan rain shadow, the Upper Mustang used to hardly receive heavy rainfall. Flooding was rare but since the last three years and especially after Kaligandaki flooding of 2018 in Mustang, flash floods have become frequent. ​​This year, Manang has reportedly received 693 per cent more rain than usual while Mustang has recorded a 476 per cent higher precipitation rate as compared to previous years, as per the Department of Hydrology and Meteorology daily rainfall pattern update reported on its official facebook page, @ClimateDHM.
Even wildfires that plagued Nepal’s forest are attributed to strange climatic impacts, most notably prolonged dry spells, and dry winters with high temperatures. Madhukar Upadhya, a Climate Change and Climate Finance Expert believes that groundwater depletion is another cause for forest fires. Apparently, groundwater helps winter grasses to grow thereby restricting wildfires. But, as Upadhya opines, loss of groundwater has altered the ecosystem. “Xeric tree species have started growing in Panchthar where natural springs have dried,” he claims. Such dry species are susceptible to catching fire and spread rapidly thereby exacerbating wildfires.
Moreover, the swarm of desert locusts that Nepal entertained the last Monsoon is also attributed to the global rise in temperature. Experts have stated that the warming of the Indian Ocean is the main reason for the proliferation of locusts. Also increasing dryness in the atmosphere is assumed to have attracted locust swarms in Nepal.
While we can blame it all on climate change, urbanisation, unchecked development, and human negligence and ignorance play a significant role in intensifying the effects of recurring natural disasters.

The Anthropocene
Nepal’s building code issued by the government strictly prohibits encroachment of rivers, streams, lakes, ponds and canals. It states that structures must be built at a distance of at least 30 metres on either side of a river or stream. But megastructures like shopping malls, hospitals, and also residential houses have been blatantly disregarding the code. Milan Lama Tamang of Tokha Municipality has shared a number of videos on TikTok account (@milanlamatamang4) trying to expose Grande International Hospital and its supposed encroachment of the Bishnumati Khola corridor.

National Business Trade Centre (NBTC) of Kalanki Khasibazzar, Kalanki Bhatbhateni are also constructed just adjacent to the Balkhu Khola bank without adhering to the 30-metre rule. It’s no wonder that the narrowing river swelled and flooded parts of Kalanki and Kuleshwor back in 2019.
Natural flow of rivers inside Kathmandu Valley has also been affected due to uncontrolled sand mining. According to Civil Engineer Manjeet Raj Pandey, sand mining has narrowed Dhobikhola, which is the reason why Anamnagar gets submerged in water every monsoon. Pandey, who has also published an elaborate report on reviving the doomed Dhobikhola, explains that sand mining carves a deeper, narrower bed, which speeds up flow and erodes banks.

Back in 1991, the Thapathali bridge collapsed due to heavy sand extraction from the river bed. Talking about bridges, recent floods have swept away several bridges this year. According to Rakesh Kumar Chaudhary, Hydropower Design Engineer, bridges in Nepal are built without any geotechnical investigation. Most bridges are also built quite closer to the river, such that when the water levels rise, they get swept away by the raging current. “A hasty and poor quality soil test leads to extremely expensive failures as highlighted by the cases of the collapsed Jabdighat Bridge over Babai River,” he shares.
Bulldozers excavating in hills, and unmanaged extraction of groundwater has also increased recently causing drying of spring resources and depletion of surface waters, claims Surendra Raj Shrestha, a Hydrogeologist. “Groundwater is excavated more than they get to recharge through rainwater harvesting. When a fire occurs, more land is likely to burn when groundwater levels get low thereby increasing the likelihood of forest fires,” he explains.

In the rush to economic development, ecological sense has been ditched in favour of explosive growth. Settlements have expanded to riverbanks, and floodplains -- increasing the scale, intensity, and duration of floods, and landslides. It seems that we are in the Anthropocene, where human activities have cumulatively resulted in climate change and have intensified the disasters of natural hazards.