Pakistan’s perfect storm is an urgent call to action
Sections of the Yangtze river dried up, forest fires burnt across France and the falling level of America’s Lake Mead revealed long-lost human remains. This summer has been heavy with examples of what a warming climate will mean to our future. Nowhere else, however, has suffered the extremes of Pakistan, which has gone from 50C temperatures to devastating floods in a few months, even as it wrestles with financial and political crises.
One-third of Pakistan is under water. More than 1,000 people have died and the cost will exceed initial estimates of $10bn by far. It is a devastating illustration of the need to invest in adaptation to a changing climate, with both general lessons on how the international community should respond and specific challenges for Pakistan.
Within Pakistan there are two clear lessons: forecasting and evacuations. There were some predictions of very high rainfall, but even to the extent forecasters got it right, it did not translate into governmental awareness. Nor did the rain’s ferocity trigger effective evacuations that could have saved lives.
Pakistan’s dysfunctional political system over decades has prevented the development of a governance structure with the resources and planning capacity to handle disasters of such magnitude. The country failed properly to improve infrastructure after severe floods in 2010. Its fractured politics look set to continue with a push from Imran Khan, ousted as prime minister in April, for early elections. He is riding a wave of populist anger, strengthened by austerity measures required as part of a $1.1bn IMF bailout package.
The country’s plight has lessons for others. There is a tendency to think of adaptation to climate change in terms of “hard” infrastructure: dams to hold back floodwaters or seawalls to keep the oceans at bay. However, “soft” adaptation such as improved flood forecasting and evacuation are as important. This should be a priority for developing nations exposed to climate change.
That is not to deny the need for physical infrastructure, which costs money. There is anger among leaders in the developing world about rich countries’ failure to provide resources for investment in adaptation. Their attitude, understandably, is that industrialised countries caused the problem with two centuries of carbon emissions, and they should pay to fix the damage. There will be vocal complaints, again, at the upcoming G20 summit in Indonesia and the COP27 climate talks in Egypt.
No matter the justice of their demands, too much focus on liability for the problem may get in the way of addressing it. Rich countries are reluctant to take on an open-ended liability. But their efforts to escape liabilities ignore their clear self-interest in bolstering climate-adaptation in countries such as Pakistan, a fragile, nuclear-armed state caught between China and the US in a volatile region.
Adaptation spending often faces less overt political opposition than efforts to phase out fossil fuels. Financing projects such as flood defences is the expertise of multilateral development banks. Rich countries should meet their responsibilities by, for example, subsidising concessional loans for adaptation on a massive scale.
In Pakistan, the challenge is complicated by the country’s debt crisis. Floods will only exacerbate Pakistan’s economic problems, creating risks that current IMF support is not enough to achieve debt sustainability. It is nonetheless important to keep the issues distinct: Pakistan should not be denied investment in climate adaptation because of fears cash will be diverted to shore up its short-term finances. Pakistanis desperately need help now, but they need a future as well.