Pakistan loses $4bn annually due to climate change, says TIP report

ISLAMABAD: Pakistan annually loses $4 billion due to climate change-induced events, says a report released by Transparency International Pakistan (TIP).

The TIP on Thursday released its report “Financing Climate Action: Enhancing Effectiveness and Transparency in Pakistan’s Climate Governance Frameworks”.

According to a TIP press release, the report is an assessment of existing frameworks driving climate governance in Pakistan with an aim to identify areas of improvement and implementation gaps, specifically focusing on transparency, inclusiveness and effectiveness of the country’s response to climate change at the federal and provincial levels.

“The report notes that Pakistan experiences an average annual loss of $4 billion due to a high vulnerability to climate change-induced events,” the TIP said, adding that Pakistan has made its NDC (nationally determined contributions) commitments contingent upon receiving adequate finance.

The report, however, admitted that since the climate finance inflows are very low, these commitments cannot be implemented without effective access to international climate finance.

Pakistan ranks among the top ten countries most impacted by climate change but it does not feature among the top ten recipients of climate finance.

The report further notes that while clear climate change mitigation and adaptation targets are set, limited progress has been made in establishing a suitable and well-integrated climate finance regime in Pakistan that can allow effective access to financial resources.

The report underlined that the climate change institutions as set under the Climate Change Act 2017 need to be operationalised and empowered and be the primary drivers of integrating climate in governance, both horizontally and vertically, across the federal and provincial governments.

Transparency International Pakistan has provided 10 recommendations to strengthen climate governance in the country, including a) Climate Change institutions as set under the Climate Change Act need to be operationalised and empowered b) A ‘whole of society’ approach which invites public and expert participation in climate planning and decision making must be adopted c) Integrate Transparency & Climate perspective in project designs including at planning and budgeting level d) Capacity Building of key auditing and reporting institutions, including corruption watchdogs e) Policy lag between national and provincial climate policies and lack of institutional capacity f) Enhance climate budgetary allocations in proportionate to the scale of climate change crisis g) Ensuring compliance with Public Procuring Regulatory Authority (PPRA) Rules to enhance transparency of climate projects h) Establish open database on Climate Finance i) Enhance climate governance integrity using global best practices j) Ensuring appropriate mechanisms and capacity to capture complaints and enforce anti-corruption measures is of vital importance.