Dr. Ikramul Haq & Abdul Rauf Shakoori
The monsoon rains that swept across Pakistan in recent weeks have left a trail of devastation, exposing once again the country’s flimsy disaster management systems and its alarming vulnerability to climate change. The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) confirmed that nearly 400 people have been killed and over 6,900 rescued during this latest spell of monsoon downpours, which began in northern Pakistan late last week.
Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, a mountainous province in the northwest that faced cloudbursts, flash floods, lightning strikes, and landslides during this year’s monsoon season, reported 356 of these fatalities.
The NDMA’s situation report further revealed that since the start of the monsoon on June 26, 2025, 707 Pakistanis have perished, highlighting the scale of loss of human life within just two months. These figures represent not just individual tragedies but a national failure to anticipate and prepare for climate-induced disasters that are no longer rare occurrences but recurring, intensified episodes.
The state, once again, has been compelled into emergency relief measures. Pakistan’s armed forces have set up logistics hubs and medical camps, with helicopters airlifting food and medicine to inaccessible areas. According to army spokesperson Lt. Gen. Ahmed Sharif Chaudhry, six infantry units and eight Frontier Constabulary units have been directly engaged in rescue operations. He added that 6,903 men, women, and children had been saved from drowning or being swept away, whereas 6,300 people received urgent medical treatment.
A complete survey is underway to assess damage to homes and infrastructure, with results expected by early September. Yet, the NDMA itself admitted that more than 50 percent of landslides are yet to be cleared. The NDMA travel advisory warned tourists against using vulnerable stretches of the Karakoram Highway and roads in Torghar, Batagram, Shangla, Gilgit, Hunza, and Skardu, where bridges such as Surmo Bridge in Ghanche and Baghecha in Skardu have collapsed, and alternate routes are unsafe or nonexistent.
The Punjab Provincial Disaster Management Authority (PDMA) has also issued warnings of heavy monsoon rains from August 19–22 across Rawalpindi, Murree, Galiyat, Attock, Chakwal, Jhelum, Gujranwala, Lahore, Gujrat, and Sialkot.
Thunderstorms are forecast in Multan, Rajanpur, and Dera Ghazi Khan, with risks of flash floods, urban inundation, and rising river levels. Citizens have been cautioned against unnecessary travel and advised keeping children away from flooded zones and live electricity wires. These measures, however, reveal a familiar pattern: repeated warnings, reactive relief, and temporary rehabilitation without addressing deeper structural vulnerabilities.
The monsoon destruction is neither accidental nor isolated. Climate change has transformed Pakistan’s rainfall cycles, turning once predictable patterns into volatile, erratic events.
The World Bank and Asian Development Bank’s Climate Risk Country Profile (2021) ranks Pakistan 18th out of 191 countries in terms of overall disaster risk, reflecting its high exposure and limited coping capacity. It is also 8th globally in flood vulnerability, regularly facing riverine floods from the Indus system and flash floods in glacial and hilly regions.
The 2022 floods, one of the most devastating in modern history, submerged one-third of Pakistan’s land, displacing 8 million people, killing 1,700 individuals (a third of them children), and causing an estimated US$14.9 billion in damages, US$15.2 billion in losses, and US$16.3 billion in recovery needs. The hardest-hit sectors were housing at US$5.6 billion, agriculture and livestock at US$3.7 billion, and transport and communications at US$3.3 billion. Sindh alone accounted for 70 percent of the damage, followed by Balochistan, KP, and Punjab.
Pakistan’s vulnerability extends beyond rainfall. The Hindu Kush–Karakoram–Himalayan (HKH) mountain range, which feeds the Indus River System, is melting at alarming rates. according to MDPI research, between 1992 and 2022, glaciers in the region lost 816 square kilometers (31%) of their area, at an average of 27 km per year. This accelerated melt, driven by rising temperatures and black carbon deposition, threatens long-term water availability for agriculture and drinking. Compounding this is the rapid siltation of Pakistan’s largest reservoirs.
Tarbela Dam has lost over 40 percent of its designed capacity due to the accumulation of 10 billion tonnes of silt, as reported in 2022. This reduces its ability to store floodwater, regulate irrigation, or generate hydropower. The country is thus not only confronting immediate flood disasters but also long-term structural risks to water security and energy supply.
The crisis does not end with floods. Air pollution, fueled by agricultural burning, industrial emissions, and vehicular smoke, has made smog a chronic hazard in Punjab. Each winter, visibility reduces drastically, halting transportation, damaging lungs, and adding yet another layer to Pakistan’s environmental burden. Meanwhile, informal settlements in hazard-prone floodplains and along riverbanks magnify risks during heavy rains, trapping the poorest in cycles of repeated destruction.
Disaster management remains reactive rather than preventive. Relief packages and rescue missions dominate headlines, while systemic planning, zoning regulations, and resilient infrastructure remain sidelined. This approach sustains a cycle where each monsoon brings predictable chaos, avoidable casualties, and billions in damage.
Despite contributing less than 1% of global greenhouse gas emissions, Pakistan is among the hardest-hit nations by climate disasters. The UN Secretary-General, during his 2022 visit, called Pakistan “a victim of climate chaos.” Yet, despite repeated global recognition, climate finance inflows remain limited.
The World Bank’s Country Climate and Development Report for Pakistan highlights that without immediate adaptation and resilience investments, climate shocks could push millions deeper into poverty. The UN’s Loss and Damage Fund and multilateral climate finance mechanisms are designed to support vulnerable nations like Pakistan, but tapping into these requires robust governance, transparent mechanisms, and credible adaptation strategies.
Currently, Pakistan struggles with credibility in the international arena, often blamed for weak institutional coordination, corruption, and lack of implementation capacity. If the government can demonstrate genuine reform—such as transparent disaster risk mapping, climate-smart agriculture programs, and resilient urban infrastructure, it could significantly increase its share of global climate finance.
Pakistan’s climate crisis is a governance challenge as much as it is an environmental one. The repeated cycle of devastation reveals structural anomalies. Disaster management remains reactive rather than preventive, the NDMA overstretched and focused on post-disaster relief rather than pre-disaster preparedness. Cities expand unchecked into flood-prone zones, with no enforcement of zoning laws.
Dams silt up, hydropower capacity declines, and water storage falls short of national needs. Despite mounting data on glacial retreat, rainfall volatility, and smog, policies remain politically expedient rather than science-driven. To reverse course, Pakistan must prioritize adaptation and resilience. This includes investing in flood defenses, strengthening early-warning systems, expanding water storage, and adopting climate-resilient agriculture. It also requires leveraging international forums, including the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, to secure climate finance not as charity but as justice.
The current spell of rains, which killed nearly 400 people and displaced thousands more, is not just a humanitarian crisis it is a warning. Climate change is no longer a distant forecast; it is a present catastrophe dismantling homes, livelihoods, and infrastructure. Each death in KP’s valleys, each collapsed bridge in Gilgit, each silted reservoir in Punjab is a reminder that Pakistan stands at the frontline of global climate collapse. If the country continues to treat each monsoon as an isolated disaster rather than a systemic climate challenge, the toll will only rise.
The choice before Pakistan is stark: it should continue the cycle of reactive relief or embrace a transformative agenda that links climate adaptation with governance reform, international finance, and sustainable development. The rains will return next year, and the question is whether Pakistan will still be counting its dead, or whether it will have learned to live resiliently with the climate reality.
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Dr. Ikramul Haq, writer and advocate of the Supreme Court, is an adjunct faculty at Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS).
Abdul Rauf Shakoori is a corporate lawyer based in the USA.