Endangering Pakistan's environment

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Endangering Pakistan's environment

Friday, 11 Jun, 2010

This Feb. 1, 2005 file photo shows an aerial view of the Siachen Glacier. Nearly 60 million people living around the Himalayas will suffer food shortages in the coming decades as glaciers shrink and the water sources they depend upon to water their crops dry up, a study concluded. -AP Photo

The federal budget 2010-2011 announced a drastic cut in the budget allocation for the Environment Division. As compared to last year's allocation of Rs 2.96 billion for projects related to the protection of the environment, this year it has been trimmed down to Rs 1 billion - a 52 per cent decrease.

Pakistan is on the brink of an environmental disaster with rising temperatures each year that threaten the country's natural resources. In the Economic Survey of Pakistan 2009-10, released just a before a day before the Federal Budget was presented in the parliament, it clearly stated that due to global climate change and the adverse effects it has on Pakistan,a lot more needs to be done. It emphatically pointed out that the negative impact of climate change is proportionally linked to levels of poverty in Pakistan. According to the report:

"Poverty is the main impediment in dealing with environment related problems [sic]. There is an increasing demand on the already depleting natural resource base of the country. Since poor are directly dependent on livelihoods ... poverty combined with a rapidly increasing population and growing urbanisation is leading to [an] intense pressure on the environment."

Pakistan was ranked twenty-nine by the Climate Change Vulnerability Index (CCVI) as compared to India's rank of fifty-six. The CCVI uses fifty 'smart indicators' that are divided under sub-heads, such as Biodiversity, Water, Desertification, Agriculture and Fisheries, Climate Change and Human Health Aspects, that help understand each country's vulnerability to climate change and its effects. The lower the number is on the index, the higher risk the country faces, which essentially means that Pakistan has been declared a high risk according to the index.

Further, the survey report added that “during the last century, average annual temperature over Pakistan increased by 0.6 °C, in agreement with the global trend, with the temperature increase over northern Pakistan being higher than over southern Pakistan (0.8 °C versus 0.5 °C)."

An ominous sign indeed. The report goes on to state that:

"If the situation goes continues it is projected that climate change will increase the variability of monsoon rains and enhance the frequency and severity of extreme events like floods and droughts. It is particularly so for Pakistan because climate change is posing a direct threat to its water security, food security and energy security ... that the average temperature over Pakistan will increase in the range 1.3 - 1.5 °C by 2020s. 2.5 - 2.8 °C by 2050s, and 3.9 - 4.4 °C by 2080s, corresponding to an increase in average global surface temperature by 2.8 - 3.4 °C by the turn of the twenty-first century.”

The weather in Pakistan is normally mild in the month of April, but this year some parts of the country - especially the southern region - experienced extreme temperatures of over 50 °C. "Summer has come early this year, deviating from the pattern of the past few years," says a meteorologist from the Meteorologicalrological Department, Karachi.

But there is some good news for Pakistan. Although the emission of greenhouse gases (mainly resulting from the use of fossil fuel) has become a worldwide concern, Pakistan accounts for only about 0.8% of the total global greenhouse gas emissions which puts it at one hundred and thirty-fifth among the world ranking of countries on the basis of their per capita emissions. But this still doesn't mean that we won't be affected by climate change.

Responding to a question regarding the drastic decrease in the budget environment-related project, a high rank official from the Federal Ministry of Environment stated that, “It’s not good. We won't have enough in the budget to protect the environment and since climate change is so rapid, we will not be equipped to meet the challenges in the future."

“Due to the serious threats to our environment and natural resources it is time to invest more in its protection," said Mahmood Akhtar Cheema, head of International Union for the Conservation of NatureIUCN, Islamabad. When asked about the cut in the federal budget, he stated: "The government knows about the state of environment in the country, we hope they take the current situation and [problems] into consideration."

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