Under the organization of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Institute of Tibet Plateau Research (ITP), an exploration team composed of researchers from Germany, Austria, Czech, and Nepal carried out studies on the Yarlung Zangbo River Basin from Sept. 12 to 26.

In three groups, the researchers conducted their field work separately on hydrological assessment of the Basin, hydrobiology and geohydrology of wetlands, and human dimension and vulnerability.

Under the leadership of ITP Director Yao Tandong, the team trekked the Basin along the river valleys of Niyang and Lhasa, and around the lakes of Namutso, Yamdrok and Mopuyong. The researchers obtained first-hand information on hydrology, vegetation, wetland, lake environment and human activities in the basin, paving the way for later research work.

The exploration is the first step of an international initiative for water management in river basins. With the support of the European Commission Six Framework Program (FP6), CAS scientists have teamed up with colleagues from EU, India, Bhutan and the International Center for Integrated Mountain Development to carry out studies on integrated water resources management (IWRM).

Entitled "Brahmatwin Brahmputra-Inn: Twinning European and South- East Asian River Basins to Enhance and Implement Adaptive Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) Strategies," the overall objective of the 3-million-Euro project is to enhance capacity to carry out a harmonized IWRM approach in headwater river systems of alpine mountain massifs, as addressed by the European Water Initiative.

Initiated in this past July, specific attention of the project is given to likely impacts of climate change, and to the transfer of professional IWRM expertise, approaches and tools based on case studies carried out in twinning European and Asian rivers: the Upper Danube River Basin in Europe, and the Upper Brahmaputra River, which is called the Yarlung Zangbo (Yarlung Tsangpo) River within the borderlines of Tibet Basin in Southeast Asia.

Two CAS institutions, i.e. ITP and the Center for Agricultural Resources Research under the Institute of Genetics and Developmental Biology, are among the 18 partners of the project consortium. Together with Europe and Asia co-workers over the next three years, they will make efforts to guarantee the generation of the necessary synergism required to represent the complex system component interaction and to carry out the required knowledge transfer between Europe and Asia.