Dying delta

The Indus Delta is dying, and Pakistan is allowing it to happen largely out of sight. Journalists, environmentalists and policymakers have repeatedly drawn attention to the worsening condition of the delta, yet the response remains fragmented and inadequate. For the communities living along the coast, the consequences are unfolding in front of their very eyes.

Seawater is consuming farmland, freshwater sources are becoming saline, fish stocks are declining and people are being forced to abandon settlements that their families have inhabited for generations. The delta depends on regular flows of freshwater and sediment from the Indus. Decades of irrigation diversions and hydraulic infrastructure have drastically reduced what reaches the sea below Kotri Barrage. The resulting ecological imbalance has allowed seawater to penetrate inland, accelerated erosion and undermined the mangrove ecosystems that once provided a natural defence for the coastline. Climate change is now intensifying these pressures. Fishing and agriculture remain central to coastal livelihoods, while mangroves provide breeding grounds for marine life and protection against storms and erosion. When these systems collapse, communities lose both their immediate incomes and their ability to withstand future climate shocks. Recent reporting has documented entire villages being abandoned as livelihoods disappear. Yet the delta continues to be treated primarily as a provincial concern. This is a serious mistake. The Indus is a national ecological system, and its deterioration has implications far beyond Thatta and Sujawal. Karachi, in particular, cannot consider itself insulated from the fate of the delta. A weakened coastal ecosystem leaves the country's largest city and its ports, industries and coastal settlements increasingly exposed to flooding, erosion and seawater intrusion.

The government must therefore move beyond sporadic mangrove plantation campaigns and develop a comprehensive strategy for the delta. Ensuring adequate environmental flows below Kotri must be central to it.