Climate challenge: Floods in Pakistan and drought in China

NEW DELHI: The neighbouring countries of India, Pakistan and China are facing the climate challenges posed by extreme weather events. On one hand, Pakistan is witnessing devastation due to floods, not seen in decades. On the other hand, China is facing severe drought and a prolonged spell of heatwave.

The National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) of Pakistan has declared72 districts as calamity-hit districts of the country out of a total of 160 districts. NDMA has also highlighted that at least 1 million houses, 3,500 kilometers of roads and over 162 bridges have been damaged or destroyed by the recent events of flood in Pakistan. Apart from that 800,000 farm animals have died and vital cropland has also been destroyed.

China, the second largest economy in the world, on the other hand, is undergoing its longest and most intense spell of heatwave, in the last 60 years. According to the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO), the heatwave is being witnessed over 4.5 million sq km of land area that constitute more than half of the total land area of the country.

Earlier, on August 23, four government departments of China issued a joint warning regarding the autumn harvest in the country. Over 75 per cent of the annual grain production of the country is produced in the autumn harvest that was under “severe threat” from drought.

This spell of heatwave is now on its 74^th day and it has affected over 900 million people out of a total population of 1.4 billion because of which power demand has increased significantly dues rise in the usage of air conditioners. The heatwave started on June 13, and now over 200 national weather observatories have observed record high temperature that reaches over 45 degree Celsius.