Pakistan’s Biodiversity Is
Disappearing, But No One
Seems to Notice
The depletion of natural habitats in Pakistan is a
problem in need of greater attention.
By Rabiya Jaffery
December 01, 2018
Credit: Flickr / wetlandsofpakistanADVERTISING
Pakistan has been facing the brunt of climate change for
quite some time. Over the past 50 years, the annual mean
temperature in Pakistan has already increased by roughly
0.5 degrees Celsius.
In 2017, a German think tank ranked Pakistan as the
seventh most vulnerable country to climate change in the
world. In addition, according to the think tank’s estimate,
between 1997 and 2016, Pakistan lost an average of 523.1
lives per year due to extreme environmental and weather
conditions. A growing number of analysts consider climate
change a major security threat multiplier in the country.
But rising temperatures are not the only manmade
environmental conditions impacting Pakistan and the rest of
the world, explains Sidra Adil, an environmental engineer
and GIS analyst.
“The impacts of climate change in Pakistan is somewhat
finally becoming an issue that is being discussed on national
levels but the impacts of biodiversity loss are yet to become
mainstream [knowledge],” says Adil. “The depletion of
natural habitats in the country are creating significant
problems already and will worsen in the long run.”
Adil is attending a UN meeting to discuss protection of
natural habitats and resources currently taking place in
Egypt. The meeting is being attended by representatives
from 196 states, including Pakistan. In the next two years,
the UN Convention on Biodiversity (UN CBD), aims to define
a post-2020 global framework on biodiversity to be adopted
in Beijing, China in 2020 — much as the Paris Agreement
did in 2015 for climate change.
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Pakistan has framed a biodiversity conservation and
protection plan aimed at stemming biodiversity loss,
restoring ecosystems and promoting sustainable use of
natural resources.
Currently, Pakistan has some 28.5 million hectares of
rangelands that are under threat of severe degradation.
“The principal cause of degradation is the rapidly increasing
domestic livestock population, which is continuing to increase
at a rate of two percent per year,” says Adil. Forests are
cleared up for land for livestock grazing as well as to grow
forage.
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“Forests in northern Pakistan are rapidly diminishing
because of deforestation while coastal areas, which have had
rich reserves of mangrove forests, are also quickly
disappearing,” she adds.
Pakistan, a semi-arid country, possesses only 5 percent of its
area as forests, and that figure is rapidly declining.
Increasing rates of consumption of fuel wood and timber as
well as the requirement for land for domestic livestock are
the principal causes of this depletion.
Mangrove forests in Pakistan’s coastal provinces extend over
132,000 hectares and represent about 3 percent of the
country’s forest area.
“These forests play a significant role in protecting ports from
floods and also provide breeding grounds for many fish,
which has commercial importance,” explains Adil. “But they
are being over-harvested and it is one of the most urgent
issues that needs to be addressed to protect the country’s
biodiversity.”
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Pakistan’s National Biodiversity Strategy and Action Plan
(NBSAP), made by the Pakistani Ministry of Climate
Change’s forestry wing in collaboration with the
International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and
the country’s provincial forest, water, environment and
wildlife experts, was approved in 2015 and is currently in
the process of implementation.
Environmental protection and conservation as well as the
sustainable use of natural resources and protection of wildlife
are outlined as key goals while the plan also addresses
tackling the underlying causes of biodiversity loss by
mainstreaming the issue across government and society in
general.
“We must cut the direct pressure on biodiversity and
promote sustainable uses. The loss of biodiversity has been
speeding up at a very high rate and all provincial forests and
wildlife departments must come together to fix it,” states a
spokesperson for the ministry. “But we also need to create
more awareness amongst people about the issue because it
cannot be solved without engaging with individual citizens.”
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While climate change and its impacts have been picking up
the attention of both policymakers and the media, the
impacts of biodiversity loss still remain largely
underdiscussed.
“What is necessary at present is to engage local communities
(both urban and rural) to understand both climate change
and biodiversity loss to create solutions using citizen and civic
movements,” says F. Fasih. Fasih is a program manager for
sustainable development at the Center of Excellence in
Responsible Business (CERB) and follows up on the private
sector’s track record in the UN Sustainable Development
Goals (SDGs) in Pakistan.
“Just take the ongoing UN conference on biodiversity —
there has been little to no local media coverage on how the
ongoing negotiations will impact Pakistan,” she adds.
“Biodiversity conservation policies must prioritize increasing
awareness amongst the citizens because very little difference
can be made by projects that require billions of dollars in
funding.”
Rabiya Jaffery is a freelance journalist and multimedia
producer based in the Middle East. She reports on
sustainability, human rights, culture, and politics for a
variety of local and regional publications. She tweets at
@rabiyasdfghjkl.
