The UNESCO Courier

Vanishing glaciers

18min | 03/13/2026

Description

Imagine a world without glaciers – a future defined by rising tides, drinking water scarcity, and a global ecosystem transformed. In the wake of the International Year of Glaciers’ Preservation 2025, this UNESCO Courier podcast investigates the "great melt" and the global urgency to act.

The scale of the crisis is vast: Antarctica’s ice is melting three times faster than it was just a decade ago, while half of the world’s mountain ice could vanish by the end of the century.

In this episode, we revisit our Vanishing Glaciersissue, bringing together perspectives from scientists, Indigenous communities, and artists witnessing this shift. We explore the global response and how the loss of our "frozen reservoirs" is redrawing local lifestyles and cultural heritage. This journey features recorded insights from Anil Mishra (UNESCO) and Ko Barrett (WMO), alongside Douglas Hardy, a glacier specialist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and Harvard researcher Emil Karpinski.

Credits: An episode by Anuliina Savolainen, production by Emmanuel Rudowski. Narration by Clare O’Hagan, with excerpts read by Max Kendrick and Anuliina Savolainen.

Media credits:

00:01:31 – 00:01:56 News extracts (Creative Commons Attribution license): “Record Ice Melting In Greenland” (Paul Morgan); “Devastation in Switzerland Today! Massive Glacier Collapse Buries The Village of Blatten” (DisasterToday); “Everest is melting. What does it tell us about climate change?” (Context News)
00:04:25: 00:04:53 Recording by the World Meteorological Organization: Launch of the International year of Glaciers’ Preservation; opening remarks by Ko Barrett, WMO Deputy Secretary-General.
00:14:39-15:24Music extract “someone, not something” from the album “Crying glacier” by Ludwig Berger and Vadret da Morteratsch

©Visual: The UNESCO Courier/ Sylvie Serpix

https://courier.unesco.org/en

https://courier.unesco.org/en/subscribe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

About The UNESCO Courier

Since 1948, The UNESCO Courier has followed its initial mission: to be a window onto the world. Beyond the slogan, this multilingual magazine constantly seeks out different viewpoints and approaches on global issues, giving voice to scientists, artists, writers, and thinkers from all over the globe. Le Corbusier, Isamu Noguchi, Chucho Valdès, Joan Miró, Kailash Satyarthi, Denis Mukwege and Yuval Noah Harari are some of the many leading personalities who have appeared in The Courier – the only international magazine to cross the iron curtain during the Cold War. Topics are never treated in isolation, but through a multiplicity of perspectives from all regions of the world.

In this podcast series we explore in depth a variety of global issues that matter today and tomorrow. Drawing on sound archives, magazine articles, and exclusive interviews, we tell the story of a constantly changing world. From culture to education, science and much more, this podcast will be your window onto the world.

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

About The UNESCO Courier

Since 1948, The UNESCO Courier has followed its initial mission: to be a window onto the world. Beyond the slogan, this multilingual magazine constantly seeks out different viewpoints and approaches on global issues, giving voice to scientists, artists, writers, and thinkers from all over the globe. Le Corbusier, Isamu Noguchi, Chucho Valdès, Joan Miró, Kailash Satyarthi, Denis Mukwege and Yuval Noah Harari are some of the many leading personalities who have appeared in The Courier – the only international magazine to cross the iron curtain during the Cold War. Topics are never treated in isolation, but through a multiplicity of perspectives from all regions of the world.

In this podcast series we explore in depth a variety of global issues that matter today and tomorrow. Drawing on sound archives, magazine articles, and exclusive interviews, we tell the story of a constantly changing world. From culture to education, science and much more, this podcast will be your window onto the world.

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

Description

Imagine a world without glaciers – a future defined by rising tides, drinking water scarcity, and a global ecosystem transformed. In the wake of the International Year of Glaciers’ Preservation 2025, this UNESCO Courier podcast investigates the "great melt" and the global urgency to act.

The scale of the crisis is vast: Antarctica’s ice is melting three times faster than it was just a decade ago, while half of the world’s mountain ice could vanish by the end of the century.

In this episode, we revisit our Vanishing Glaciersissue, bringing together perspectives from scientists, Indigenous communities, and artists witnessing this shift. We explore the global response and how the loss of our "frozen reservoirs" is redrawing local lifestyles and cultural heritage. This journey features recorded insights from Anil Mishra (UNESCO) and Ko Barrett (WMO), alongside Douglas Hardy, a glacier specialist at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, and Harvard researcher Emil Karpinski.

Credits: An episode by Anuliina Savolainen, production by Emmanuel Rudowski. Narration by Clare O’Hagan, with excerpts read by Max Kendrick and Anuliina Savolainen.

Media credits:

00:01:31 – 00:01:56 News extracts (Creative Commons Attribution license): “Record Ice Melting In Greenland” (Paul Morgan); “Devastation in Switzerland Today! Massive Glacier Collapse Buries The Village of Blatten” (DisasterToday); “Everest is melting. What does it tell us about climate change?” (Context News)
00:04:25: 00:04:53 Recording by the World Meteorological Organization: Launch of the International year of Glaciers’ Preservation; opening remarks by Ko Barrett, WMO Deputy Secretary-General.
00:14:39-15:24Music extract “someone, not something” from the album “Crying glacier” by Ludwig Berger and Vadret da Morteratsch

https://courier.unesco.org/en

https://courier.unesco.org/en/subscribe

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

About The UNESCO Courier

Since 1948, The UNESCO Courier has followed its initial mission: to be a window onto the world. Beyond the slogan, this multilingual magazine constantly seeks out different viewpoints and approaches on global issues, giving voice to scientists, artists, writers, and thinkers from all over the globe. Le Corbusier, Isamu Noguchi, Chucho Valdès, Joan Miró, Kailash Satyarthi, Denis Mukwege and Yuval Noah Harari are some of the many leading personalities who have appeared in The Courier – the only international magazine to cross the iron curtain during the Cold War. Topics are never treated in isolation, but through a multiplicity of perspectives from all regions of the world.

In this podcast series we explore in depth a variety of global issues that matter today and tomorrow. Drawing on sound archives, magazine articles, and exclusive interviews, we tell the story of a constantly changing world. From culture to education, science and much more, this podcast will be your window onto the world.

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

About The UNESCO Courier

Since 1948, The UNESCO Courier has followed its initial mission: to be a window onto the world. Beyond the slogan, this multilingual magazine constantly seeks out different viewpoints and approaches on global issues, giving voice to scientists, artists, writers, and thinkers from all over the globe. Le Corbusier, Isamu Noguchi, Chucho Valdès, Joan Miró, Kailash Satyarthi, Denis Mukwege and Yuval Noah Harari are some of the many leading personalities who have appeared in The Courier – the only international magazine to cross the iron curtain during the Cold War. Topics are never treated in isolation, but through a multiplicity of perspectives from all regions of the world.

In this podcast series we explore in depth a variety of global issues that matter today and tomorrow. Drawing on sound archives, magazine articles, and exclusive interviews, we tell the story of a constantly changing world. From culture to education, science and much more, this podcast will be your window onto the world.

Hosted on Ausha. See ausha.co/privacy-policy for more information.

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