PHOTO: AFP
ISLAMABAD: Citizens can play a significant role to improve the climate by reducing consumption of mechanically produced goods and industrial products, and reducing carbon footprint by monitoring their consumption patterns.
The exuberant lifestyle has led to over consumption of products inorganically or industrially produced, hence putting more pressure on the natural resources either as input to the production or disposing off the industrial waste.
Devcom-Pakistan Director Munir Ahmed made these remarks in an interactive session with the business undergraduate at the School of Business Management, Quaid-e-Azam University, here Saturday. Theme of the interactive session was “citizens’ role in reducing climate impact”.
He said the unchecked global warming over the decades has changed the climate to the point where we have starting facing the brunt of it.
Though the countries like Pakistan or some of the African states are not the contributor to the climate change but unfortunately are the most vulnerable to the disastrous impact.
Ahmed said,as individuals and responsible citizens, we need to see and check the four factors that are contributing to causes of the climate change.
Firstly, the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere – every citizen around the globe shall try to reduce the activities causing the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Secondly, people need to protect the carbon sinks – the forests that are being cut by the timber mafia and unplanned and unchecked housing societies in the case of Pakistan.
“Our national and sub-national governments are more interested in planting samplings but hardly seen anyone interested in saving trees.
Voices should emerge together against such indiscriminate environment unfriendly practices.
The unplanned massive housing schemes in the mountains are adding to the vulnerability of communities living there and enhancing the challenges of disasters downstream too. Thirdly, we all shall play our role in reducing the amount of carbon emissions created by public transportation, private vehicles and the factories. The CFCs emitted from the home electric appliances, and fourthly the methane emissions from the animal and other wastes.
Irrational use of pesticides in the agriculture and burning the fields after the crops are picked up also contributing to the climate impact.
Ahmed said: Climate change is the transboundary phenomenon that is enhanced by the local contributing factors. By improving environmental conditions around us, somehow we can reduce the local impact of the changing climate. However, we need to develop adaptation mechanisms to combat the larger, widespread and intense impact of the climate change.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 22nd, 2019.
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