When Nepal’s spring is no longer spring

For nearly six weeks, parts of Nepal have witnessed rainfall almost every day, monthly preiciotation in April was three times average.

Instead of the familiar pre-monsoon heat, gusty winds, thunderstorms with hail, the weather remained unusually cool, humid and cloudy. This pattern appears likely to continue until the monsoon fully sets in.

This may simply feel like a pleasant break from heat and dust for many. But it is also a reminder that Nepal’s seasonal rhythms are changing in ways we are only beginning to understand.

There have been visible benefits. Forest fires are not as bad as they have in the last few years. Pre-monsoon showers have helped clear dust and pollution from the air. Springs in the mid-hills are flowing again. Higher elevations have received fresh snowfall, offering temporary relief to fragile mountain ecosystems.

Yet the same rains have also exposed vulnerabilities. Farmers who prepared for a drier spring have suffered crop losses from excess moisture and disrupted planting schedules.

Construction projects have slowed as roads became difficult to access and transport systems unreliable. Along the BP Highway, repeated landslides and flooding have already caused disruption requiring emergency response.

The larger message is clear: Nepal’s pre-monsoon season is becoming increasingly unpredictable. For generations, people planned farming, water use and infrastructure activities around relatively stable seasonal expectations.

That reliability is weakening. Climate change is not only increasing temperatures, it is also reshaping the timing, intensity and behaviour of rainfall itself.

This demands a different way of thinking about water, weather and development. First, Nepal urgently needs stronger localised weather information and early warning systems. Farmers can no longer rely only on traditional calendars when deciding what to plant or when to harvest.

Construction companies, transport operators and local governments also need timely forecasts to reduce losses and improve planning. Better climate information is no longer a luxury — it is an economic necessity.

Springs have either dried up or declined in nearly three-quarters of surveyed areas in Nepal. Road construction, changing land use, erratic rainfall and other human pressures have all contributed. In Sindhuli and many similar districts, smaller springs that once sustained settlements are now struggling to survive.

Protecting these sources requires more than short-term projects. It calls for sustained investment in watershed conservation, recharge ponds, soil moisture retention and community-led spring management.

Second, Nepal must stop treating water as a sector isolated from everything else. Every road, every town expansion, every agricultural investment and every business activity affects water systems in one way or another — either by altering recharge areas, increasing extraction or polluting sources.

Public investment therefore needs to place water security at the centre of planning, regardless of sector. Too often, development programmes operate in silos: one office builds roads, another manages irrigation, another handles drinking water, while none adequately protect the catchments and recharge zones that sustain all three.

The result is fragmented development and growing water stress. Integrated planning is no longer optional. It is essential.

Third, Nepal must rethink its growing dependence on aquifers. In the Tarai, groundwater extraction for irrigation has expanded rapidly as surface water systems become less reliable.

Pumping water may temporarily solve shortages, but it creates deeper long-term risks if recharge systems are neglected.

The irony is that Nepal receives enormous volumes of rainfall every year, yet much of it is lost quickly through runoff, erosion and poorly planned landscapes. Reviving ponds, protecting aahals, conserving open land and reducing unnecessary concretisation are not outdated ideas — they are critical climate adaptation measures.

Rainwater harvesting and groundwater recharge must become part of mainstream development practice rather than isolated pilot activities.

I am writing this from the hills of Sindhuli, where I have been travelling with the Muhan Mission — a collaboration among Nepali and Australian researchers, local governments, and communities working to revive drying spring sources.

Sindhuli’s leasons are relevant far beyond one district. This year’s unusual pre-monsoon rains are not simply a weather anomaly. It reflects a broader transition towards more uncertain and uneven climate behaviour — where benefits and disasters can arrive together. Nepal cannot prevent these global climatic shifts alone. But it can prepare for them.

That preparation begins with treating springs, watersheds and local water systems not as peripheral environmental concerns, but as the foundation of national resilience.

The future of agriculture, energy, public health, infrastructure and local livelihoods all depend on how seriously Nepal’s new government and others to follow respond to these early warning signs from a changing climate.

Ngamindra Dahal is a hydrometeorologist with the Nepal Water Conservation Foundation specialising in climate and water management issues.