The Ambition on Melting Ice (AMI) high-level group on Sea- level Rise and Mountain Water Resources was founded by 20 government ministers on November 16, 2022 at COP27 in Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt. AMI aims to ensure that the irreversible and devastating global impacts of cryosphere loss are understood by political leaders and the public alike: not only within mountain and polar regions, but throughout the planet.

As stated in the founding Declaration, “protecting the cryosphere through vigorous climate action is not a matter for mountain and polar nations alone: it is a matter of urgent global concern, because the greatest impacts on human communities lie well outside these regions.”

The cryosphere is a term for Earth’s frozen regions covered in snow or ice, either seasonally or throughout the year. Retreating glaciers, melting polar ice sheets on Antarctica and Greenland, thawing permafrost, disappearing sea ice and rapidly acidifying polar oceans all pose a devastating threat to communities on a global scale. The AMI high-level group underscores that only limiting global warming to 1.5°C through immediate emissions cuts can slow cryosphere loss in time, and limit the resulting widespread loss and damage that ultimately will affect every country on Earth.

Additional governments will be welcomed to sign the AMI Declaration in future. At COP29 in November 2024, Germany and Palau joined AMI.