Web Desk (LTN NEWS): Climate Change Minister Sherry Rehman said Monday that a third of Pakistan is under water because of flooding caused by record monsoon rains. She called it a “crisis of unimaginable proportions.”
Officials say that at least 33 million people, or one out of every seven Pakistanis, have been affected by the floods, which have killed 1,136 people since the monsoon started in June.
Large areas of farmland in the southern Sindh and western Balochistan provinces are now just bodies of water. In the north, raging mountain rivers have destroyed roads and bridges.
“It’s hard to believe how bad things are on the ground,” Rehman told in an interview.
They ask, “Where do we pump the water? when we send them water pumps. All of it is one big ocean, and there is nowhere dry to pump the water out.”
Rehman said that “literally a third” of Pakistan is under water, and he compared it to a dystopian movie.
She also thought that the number of deaths would go up because many parts of the north of the country are still cut off by flooded rivers.
Rehman repeated the government’s request for help from other countries and said that the major industrialized countries were to blame for global warming.
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Pakistan is responsible for less than 1% of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, but the NGO Germanwatch says it is the eighth country most likely to be affected by extreme weather because of climate change.
Rehman said that the floods would be very bad for Pakistan’s economy, which is already in trouble.
She said, “Sindh is half of Pakistan’s food basket, but it won’t be able to grow till next season.”
“Not only will it hurt our exports, but it will also hurt our food security.”
Rehman said that it would take time to figure out how much damage the floods caused.
“Right now, after everyone has been saved, we will feed, cook meals for, and give shelter to everyone,” she said.
“We also need to look for the spread of medical camps, because in a place like that, the disease is always the next threat.”
Monday night, the board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) meeting to decide whether or not to give the go-ahead to restart a $6 billion loan program. However, it is already clear that it will take much more than $6 billion to fix and rebuild after this monsoon.
Rehman said, “We are in touch with our big donors. Let’s hope they can come up with something that can really help one of the countries most affected by climate change when it needs it.”
