Climate change and environmental activists on Tuesday underlined the need to create awareness about negative impacts of the climate change on the citizens' lives and environment of urban centres. For this purpose they suggested to have a close liaison between climate change activists, organisations, environmental protection and other government agencies.
The experts were speaking at a meeting on climate change, organised by The Knowledge Forum (TKF) at the office of National Commission for Human Rights. Representative of climate change movements, government departments, environmental activists, urban planners and some representatives from the European Climate Fund and their partners participated in the meeting.
"People in the major cities like Karachi are facing heat waves, delayed winters, where people suffer in Lahore and other cities of Punjab due to smog," said an urban planner Muhammed Toheed.
According to him, people in the cities are still not taking the climate change challenges seriously. He said that the gap for creating awareness of the environmental impacts should be bridged through continuous awareness programmes.
Adil Ayub of Climate Action Pakistan pointed out that the concerned citizens had organised climate marches in the city this year and in 2019, for creating awareness about climate change. This year, the climate march was held in the city last week, but the administration did not allow it to move from Clifton Beach to Bilawal Chowrangi, he lamented.
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Earlier, in 2019 a climate march was held in major cities and was attended by thousands of people in Karachi and Lahore, he said adding that mobilisation of people on environmental issues is a must.
Zahid Farooq from the Urban Resource Centre said the local government has allowed erecting contract mountains in the form of high-rise building, which is the cause of heatwaves in the city.
He said close cooperation between the environmental agencies and the citizens' groups are a must. He pointed out that all industrial and municipal waste is directly going into the sea without any treatment. There were three water treatment plants, but all are non-functional.
Mushtaq Gaadi from TARA Foundation said that people's movement can create a major impact on the protection of the environment. He pointed out that it was a local people's movement that raised the issue of environmental threats due to coal power projects in Tharparkar district. He said external support to Thari activists arrive later but initially, it was affected people, who mobilised themselves and protested against the violation of their rights.
Speaking on the occasion a representative of Pakistan Fisherfolk Forum (PFF), Aslam Mallah said that due to coal mining and coal-fired power plants in the Tharparkar region people have started suffering displacement and diseases. Two power plants have started generating power on Thar coal in Block-2 and more are coming in. Human beings and animals are facing environmental threats due to coal projects, he added.
Irum Ayaz from Pakistan Red Crescent Society said that her organisation is working for climate change at three levels: with global movements and at the national level and internally at Red Crescent.
Dr Nuzhat Khan Director-General of the National Institute of Oceanography (NIO) suggested that business solutions for environmental protection should be promoted which would protect the environment and would also help in the overall development of the country.
Published in The Express Tribune, December 22nd, 2021.
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