Flood pushed 5m more below poverty line: report

Another five million people in Sindh's rural areas were pushed below the poverty line due to the destruction caused by last year's flood. The number of food insecure people has also increased by 4.3 million.

This was revealed in a meeting between the Sindh Chief Minister Murad Ali Shah and International Rescue Committee (IRC) CEO David Miliband, who joined it digitally, to discuss a need assessment report on the destruction caused by the flood. The IRC also agreed to work with the Sindh government in post-flood relief activities especially against malnutrition.

The report detailed the extent of the devastation that saw large swathes of land in the province submerged, over two million housing units destroyed and 450,000 livestock dead. Of Sindh's 30 districts, 24 were declared 'calamity-hit'. More than 12.4 million people were affected in the province with over 1,000 lives lost in the flooding that followed last year's monsoon.

The report estimated that an additional five million people pushed below the poverty line. Almost half of Sindh's population of around 50 million people live in rural areas. At least 37% of those 25 million lived below the poverty line, according to a World Bank report form last year.

Published in The Express Tribune, April 15^th, 2023.