ISLAMABAD – Pakistan is facing the 10th consecutive year of flood and 4thconsecutive year of drought which endorsed the fact that water has become afrontline issue for the countries’ like Pakistan.
Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies, Boston University Dean DrAdil Najam remarked this during his address at a public talk on GlobalClimate Change and its Implications for Pakistan, organised by theInstitute of Strategic Studies Islamabad (ISSI), here under itsDistinguished Lecture Series.
He said, “The world has entered into the age of adaptation, unlikemitigation which is something initial in the global environmentaldegradation scenario. Pakistan is the country facing climate change by andlarge which depends solely on the water where the climate is not a futureissue but a current issue for the country.”
“Water is to adaptation what carbon is to mitigation. The frontline issuesare mostly about water and for a country like Pakistan whose topography andterrain are disaster-induced. West India (mainly Pakistan) cannot survivewithout floods as the mother Indus River feeds the arid lands of theregion. They are not bad rather our no mechanism for flood management turnsit into a disaster causing heavy economic and human life losses to thecountry,” he added.
Dr Adil Najam while talking about the age of adaptation said vulnerabilitywas inversely proportional to how much countries contribute.
“Even though a number of developing countries have taken the lead, but inmany ways, most have stepped back. Institutional failures of any sort causedisruptions in the social fabric of a country. Cognizance is required thatnature will not be a silent spectator. We have passed the age of mitigationand have landed in the age of adaptation,” he said.
“Countries which are emitting the most of carbon waste are those which areleast affected by the effects of climate change. Almost 80 per cent of thewealth of the world lies with the 20 per cent of the world’s populationwhich resulted in poor climate politics in response to climate action.However, these things do not make headlines anymore. Climate change is aglobal phenomenon which needs to be dealt in a wholesome manner as everyoneis affected by its fallout,” he mentioned.
Narrating the consequent issues caused due to climate change other thanwater, he said, “If water is the frontline issue, then automatically, foodis a key issue as well. Mobility is also one of the issues related to thisas is infrastructure – a lot of problems can be solved by properinfrastructure in buildings.”
Dr Najam also spoke about climate and security, one of the dimensions ofwhich was violence.
At the state level, it was clear that insecurity was shown as war. However,there was also insecurity at the societal level as well, which was why thenumber of civil violence deaths had been eight times more than those causedby war.
Pakistan was a country that was totally defined by the climate which waschanging rapidly, he said adding the Attabad Lake was a prime example ofclimate change in this regard.
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He pointed out that the world was moving towards loss and damage because ofsheer negligence.
Earlier, in his welcome remarks, ISSI Director-General Ambassador AizazAhmad Chaudhry said the so-called traditional security discourse, whilecritically important, was also incomplete.
To ignore non-traditional dimensions of security was, in fact, to make themodern state less secure, including on national security.
Pakistan is one of the countries at great risk of the impacts of climatechange. For Pakistan, water scarcity is one of the biggest securitychallenges arising out of the climate change issue. It is an existentialthreat. It is no longer long-term; it is immediate-term. It may even be asbig or bigger than any inter-state threat we have from our very hostileneighbourhood. What we need is urgent action, he said.
In his concluding remarks, ISSI Board of Governors Ambassador KhalidMahmood said there was now a growing awareness of the effects of climatechange. Ignoring the impacts of climate change is no longer a luxury thatany country can afford, least of all, Pakistan.
In order to meet the challenges, the country will first have to learn howto negotiate through these challenges and follow words with actions.
Pakistan has to increase efforts in the context of common butdifferentiated responsibilities to reduce domestic emissions from allsectors.
At the same time, the government should assess and identify localcommunities most affected and develop national and local adaptationstrategies on how to deal with the impacts, relying on internationalsupport to do this. One example is through the Green Climate Fund, heconcluded.
