Not a penny proposed for NFPP in budget

CCI’s approval of Rs177.661b for 10-year flood plan neglected

ISLAMABAD: The federal government has not allocated a single penny for the National Flood Protection Plan (NFPP) 2015-25 in the recently announced federal budget 2017-18 despite the fact that countless precious lives have been lost and hundreds of thousands of people have been rendered homeless in floods over the last couple of years in the country.

Even though heavy floods triggered by rains killed 2,000 people in 2010 in Pakistan, it took the Council of Common interest (CCI) nearly eight years till May 2 this year to approve the overall cost of Rs177.661 billion for the NFPP 2015-25 on a 50-50 share basis between the federal government and the provincial governments.



Pakistan is under the influence of extreme climate change, but the government still seems least bothered to take preventive measures to avoid any untoward situation arising from it.

Talking to The Express Tribune, an official working closely with the Ministry of Water and Power said, “After the approval from the CCI, we were expecting to get some amount to launch the project.”

Only a nod from the CCI does not mean that the NFPP will be of any help in the monsoon seasons, said the official, who requested anonymity. He said after CCI’s approval, the NFPP will take several years to be effectively implemented.

Since the 2010 natural disaster, he said, the NFPP 2015-25 had passed through several stages and faced huge challenges and nepotism, but finally in 2017, it was approved by the CCI.

Pakistan is bearing the brunt of the climate change, the official said, adding that almost every year the country faced massive flooding claiming hundreds of lives, besides affecting the economy.



According to a report by the US World Resource Institute published in 2015, it has been indicated that Pakistan’s gross domestic product is affected 1.0 per cent annually due to river flooding.

It further revealed that the floods had caused a loss of Rs334 billion a year in monetary terms to the country over the last five years.