Monsoon rains may trigger ‘emergency situation’ in Pakistan, warns disaster management authority
ISLAMABAD: Heavy rains during the upcoming monsoon season may cause an “emergency situation” in Pakistan, particularly in its Sindh and Punjab provinces, the head of the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) warned on Wednesday.
Monsoon season in Pakistan typically runs from July to September. The NDMA last week warned that Punjab may suffer urban flooding in the monsoon season, saying that Pakistan’s most populous province is expected to receive more downpours this year.
Large swathes of the South Asian nation were submerged in 2022 due to extremely heavy monsoon rains and melting glaciers, a phenomenon linked to climate change that damaged crops and infrastructure and killed at least 1,700 people, displaced millions and inflicted billions of dollars in losses.
NDMA Chairman Lt. Gen. Inam Haider Malik said the authority has completed early preparations as part of a proactive approach to minimize damages during the upcoming monsoon season.
“Currently, monsoon impacts are being felt in India, particularly in central India and Bangladesh, as well as parts of the Indian Ocean,” Malik said at an event in Islamabad related on climate change effects.
“If this pattern continues, we anticipate it will affect Pakistan, especially in the Punjab and Sindh regions,” he said. “Potentially creating an emergency situation due to heavy rains.”
He said the NDMA had spoken to Pakistan’s provincial administrations to prepare for the emergency situation, adding that it had disseminated adviseries and information to the relevant authorities.
“The NDMA has taken several actions recently, including providing early warnings, conducting training, fostering collaborations and coordinating with provincial authorities,” Malik shared.
He said natural disasters impact around four percent of Pakistan’s population each year. However, the NDMA chief said new technologies obtained from around the world offered hope for economic relief and helped shift the government’s response from a reactive one to a proactive one.
“Our traditional response is reactive, which is often insufficient when a disaster unfolds and we aim to enhance this through hybrid reactive and proactive measures for a more comprehensive approach,” he added.
Malik said Pakistan has developed a state-of-the-art National Emergencies Operations Center (NEOC) to prepare for such calamities.
Set up in October 2023, the NEOC is equipped with the latest tools and technologies, including real-time satellite feeds, to anticipate disasters up to three months in advance.
“The center houses over 220 different satellites and feeds, gathering all climate disaster data and projections from around the world to handle any kind of emergency,” Malik explained.
The NDMA chief said Pakistan’s floodplains were facing serious challenges as recently conducted analyzes of the country’s river systems indicated that river volumes were decreasing due to area inundations, encroachments, and siltation.
He said the NDMA is trying to collaborate with some non-governmental organizations and humanitarian groups to ward off a potential water crisis in the country.
Prior to the 2022 devastating floods, 20 million people in Pakistan were affected by floods in 2010 with damage to infrastructure running into billions of dollars and huge swathes of crops destroyed.
