Pakistan improves on global climate change vulnerability rankings

• Pakistan reduces vulnerability to climate change
• Germanwatch uses data from 2000-2019 to analyse and rank countries
• Pakistan lost 0.52% per unit of its GDP due to climate change
• Pakistan witnessed 173 climate-related events in 19 years

A recent study has found that Pakistan was able to reduce its vulnerability to climate change by three points.

Titled "Global Climate Risk Index 2021", the report by Germanwatch was released on Monday and showed Pakistan drop from 5th most vulnerable country to climate change, to the 8th position.

The think-tank said it took into account most data from 2000 to 2019 to analyze and rank "to what extent the countries and regions have been affected by impacts of climate-related extreme weather event" such as storms, floods, and heatwaves.

In 2019, Pakistan was listed eighth most vulnerable country but it climbed three spots to attain the fifth position in 2020. Despite the improvement in its standing this year, Pakistan is still ranked amongst the top ten countries most at risk of climate change.

The report has warned that “countries like Haiti, the Philippines, and Pakistan are …continuously ranked among the most affected countries both in the long-term index and in the index for the respective year.”

Its Long-Term Climate Risk Index highlighted Pakistan lost 0.52% per unit of its GDP due to climate change and 173 climate-related events from 2000 to 2019.

The ruling party's Rai Muhammad Murtaza Iqbal, member of the standing committee of the National Assembly on climate change, calls the demotion a “big achievement”.

“Pakistan was striving hard to take measures to reduce the impact of climate change,” he told Geo.tv, “This improvement should be seen in the backdrop of administrative measures taken by the PTI government since coming into power in 2018 in the Centre and in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa since 2013.”

Iqbal further added that the ruling party’s tree plantation drive and especially its 10 Billion Tree Tsunami initiative is being pushed vigorously throughout the country to slow and reverse global warming.