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WATER POLITICS

Via ProPakistani, a report on the significant impact that poor water management has upon Pakistan:

Poor water resource management is estimated to cost Pakistan $12 billion per annum (4 percent of GDP), with the degradation of the Indus Delta costing another $2 billion.

The Ministry of Climate Change in its report “Living Indus: Investing in Ecological Restoration”, said these projections may be underestimates, given the unavailability of robust ecological and social costs. It further projects the required annual investment for climate change adaption to be between $7 billion to $14 billion.

The report highlights that the Indus is the backbone of Pakistan’s agricultural economy. Pakistan already loses an average of 4 percent of its GDP due to water-related economic impacts – inadequate water supply and sanitation, flood damages, and water scarcity in agriculture. This estimate does not include the indirect cost of loss of ecosystem services.

“Degradation of the Indus Delta has been estimated to cost over $2 billion annually because of foregone ecosystem services. Around half is agricultural loss caused by waterlogging and salinity, and half is loss of Delta ecosystem services (including from mangrove forests and fisheries),” it added.

According to the report, it is estimated that with the rise of average temperature (0.5 to 2-degree celsius), agricultural productivity could decrease by around 8-10 percent by 2040.

Climate change is expected to cause the degradation of pastures and grazing lands owing to drought, floods, and a rise in temperature and, ultimately, loss of land productivity, decrease in fodder quality and quantity and increase in disease epidemics. The required annual investment for climate change adaptation has been estimated to be $7-14 billion, including $2-3.8 billion to reduce just flood vulnerability.

The report warned that the consequences of these changes will be felt across key sectors of Pakistan’s economy, including agriculture, livestock, energy, forests, fisheries, and health, and will be exacerbated by the effect of climate change on water. Women are more vulnerable to the effects of climate change than men in many of these contexts because they are more reliant on natural resources for a living, often shouldering the responsibility for securing water, food, and fuel for cooking and heating for their families. In Pakistan, existing inequalities in access to resources and decision-making, as well as socioeconomic barriers, limit women’s ability to cope with climate change.

The report remarks that this snapshot of climatic vulnerability is a small backdrop to more “insidious societal and ecological implications” that expected climate change could bring about. While some of the impacts are unavoidable, their magnitude can and should be mitigated.