Is Pakistan Responsible for the 2022 Floods | Cost of Climate Change | Govt. Risk Management 🇵🇰

Sundus Siddiqi (Climate Change Specialist - World Bank), Nimra Hayat (Environmental Engineer and Data Scientist - Amazon), and Nauraiz Rana (Economist - World Bank) engage in a thought provoking discussion, highlighting not only the causes behind the 2022 floods in Pakistan, but also the underlying institutional and systemic challenges, including poor urban planning and water resource management, lack of systems for infrastructure maintenance, complex governance, structural inequalities, and limited disaster risk reduction capacity – all of which coupled with climate change have exposed the people of Pakistan to greater risk, pronouncing their sufferings. The floods showed Pakistan's high vulnerability to climate change despite contributing less than one percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. One-third of the country was submerged under water, and 33 million people were affected. Nearly 8 million people are reportedly displaced. The floods took the lives of more than 1,700 people, one-third of them children. The total damage is estimated at US$14.9 billion, total loss at US$15.2 billion, and total needs at US$16.3 billion. Moving forward, the reconstruction and rehabilitation from the floods need to be climate-resilient, inclusive, and people-centric, leveraging the power of community. At the same time, Pakistan needs to build on the lessons from these floods to build longer-term systemic resilience as a hedge against future events. There’s need for reforms which will require the government to make smart but tough decisions, even within its limited fiscal space, and create an enabling environment to raise revenue while also attracting further international finance. Pakistan must also act to correct the structural inequalities and inefficiencies in its systems, institutions, practices, and policies, that have been holding the country back from achieving its vision of equitable and sustainable growth for all. To do this, the leadership needs to ensure appropriate devolution of responsibilities and resources to local governments, including arrangements for the mobilization of revenue, and provide avenues for citizens to register their concerns and hold service providers accountable.