Climate change is driving extreme weather and rising temperatures, fueled by greenhouse gas emissions and industrial pollution. Pakistan faces severe food insecurity and economic losses from floods, underscoring the urgent need for sustainable agriculture and bold climate action.

Climate change is now a stark reality, no longer confined to science fiction stories and movies. It involves the shifting of weather patterns and conditions, driven by various factors that rapidly increase global temperatures on Earth. This is a significant concern. The melting glaciers, leading to rising sea levels, are widely recognized consequences. Hazardous factors like pollution, coal burning, and industrial waste disposal into the air have profoundly altered the climate, impacting the environment and its resources. Addressing climate change requires raising social awareness and implementing stringent measures to protect and preserve the environment.
Unfortunately, Pakistan is severely impacted by changing climatic patterns and faces the monumental task of combating climate change effects while ensuring food security for its rapidly growing population. Crops like rice, vegetables, cereals, spices, and grains in Pakistan are particularly sensitive to climate variations. Rising temperatures and altered rainfall patterns have led to water shortages, worsening food security by reducing crop productivity. Climate change encompasses shifts in average weather conditions, resulting in severe storms, heatwaves, floods, and glacier melting. These changes are significantly affecting livelihoods and ecosystems worldwide.

We experience extreme weather conditions, whether it's cold, heat, or rain. Greenhouse gas emissions, coal burning, deforestation, air pollution, and industrial gases contribute significantly to climate change, leading to major climatic shifts on Earth. These changes result in disastrous events that affect livelihoods, health, and resources, impacting water, air, and land quality.

Climate change, which includes global warming, results in the release of carbon dioxide and greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. Nowadays, we experience extreme weather conditions, whether it's cold, heat, or rain. Greenhouse gas emissions, coal burning, deforestation, air pollution, and industrial gases contribute significantly to climate change, leading to major climatic shifts on Earth. These changes result in disastrous events that affect livelihoods, health, and resources, impacting water, air, and land quality. Extreme weather conditions such as droughts, heavy rain, floods, storms, heatwaves, and forest fires are increasingly common. Additionally, climate change diminishes drinking water quality, damages property, pollutes the air, and results in loss of life, while also impacting the surrounding flora and fauna.
We need to take extreme measures to prevent climate change. Overcoming its disastrous effects is challenging but not impossible with effort and determination. Modern society is mobilizing globally to combat this threat. Pakistan, with its agricultural economy, must make substantial efforts to address climate change. Collaboration between the government and people is crucial to raise social awareness, prohibit deforestation and tree cutting, maintain clean surroundings, and ban the use of chemical fertilizers. Wastage of water and natural resources must stop, flora and fauna protected, and more trees planted while strictly preserving the environment and resources, and reducing energy consumption. These measures can mitigate climate change, preventing worsened weather conditions, water shortages, reduced agricultural yields, and livelihood impacts. Focus on reducing anthropogenic activities is essential for clean air and water. These steps protect the environment and resources. Pakistan, regionally highly vulnerable to climate change, experiences profound impacts on its agricultural sector. Rising temperatures from greenhouse gas emissions significantly affect crop growth, yield, and quality, impacting the agrarian economy.
Pakistan, ranked among the top ten countries most affected by climate change according to the Global Climate Risk Index 2021, recently experienced devastating floods in 2022. These floods affected 33 million people, displaced over 200,000 individuals, claimed more than 1,700 lives, and caused extensive damage to approximately 3 million infrastructures and the agricultural sector, resulting in an estimated economic loss of USD 16 billion. The World Bank estimates that about 400 million people in South Asia are at risk of food insecurity due to climate change impacts. According to the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), South Asia accounted for 27 percent of the global undernourished population in 2020-2021, with approximately 199.2 million people experiencing hunger.
The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) warns that climate change could potentially reduce wheat yields by up to 50 percent in certain parts of South Asia by 2050. These alarming figures emphasize the urgent need for action to address the impacts of climate change on food security in the region.
The agricultural sector in South Asia faces additional hurdles due to shifting precipitation patterns. Erratic rainfall distribution and prolonged dry spells are increasingly prevalent, negatively impacting soil moisture, crop irrigation, and overall agricultural productivity. Consequently, water scarcity and drought conditions further strain food production systems, necessitating the adaptation of agricultural practices to ensure food security.
Extreme weather events, such as cyclones, heatwaves, and floods, have emerged as some of the most devastating consequences of climate change in Pakistan. These recurrent phenomena disrupt planting and harvesting seasons, damage infrastructure, and exacerbate soil erosion, resulting in a decline in food production and heightened vulnerability for farmers and communities reliant on agriculture.
Vulnerability to climate change in South Asia goes beyond geographical factors and is intertwined with socioeconomic dynamics. Poverty, limited resource access, and weak infrastructure worsen the impact of climate change on food security. Communities in impoverished regions often lack the financial means to invest in climate-resilient agriculture or cope with climate-related shocks. The limited access to education and healthcare further reduces the adaptive capacity of vulnerable populations. Climate change imposes impacts and costs on society and the environment, thus conditioning the possibilities of life and development for present and future generations. Its manifestations are diverse: on the one hand, the primary manifestations of climate change are physical (e.g., rainfall, increased frequency of extreme weather events, changes in temperature, and sea levels); on the other hand, the secondary manifestations are much more diverse and not as easily predictable, including ecological, social, and economic consequences. 
Moreover, its effects do not have similar impacts on the whole of the world population as it presents more severe consequences in certain most vulnerable groups or areas, many of them also characterized by problems of scarcity of food or periods of frequent famines. This is the case in some developing countries, where the subsistence of millions of people is highly dependent on activities closely linked to sectors significantly exposed to climate change, such as agriculture and livestock farming. This population is more vulnerable to climate change risk as they have precarious economic conditions that reduce their financial and technical capacities to deal with it and its consequences. Then, the trajectories of poverty reduction and the efforts to ensure food security are undermined. 

Pakistan, ranked among the top ten countries most affected by climate change according to the Global Climate Risk Index 2021, recently experienced devastating floods in 2022.

The worldwide human population has more than tripled since the mid-20th century, from an estimated 2.5 billion in 1950 to 8.0 billion by mid-November 2022, with one billion people added since 2010 and two billion since 1998. Since 1950, the population has roughly doubled every 37 years, reaching five billion in 1987. Predictions suggest the world's population will double again in over 70 years, surpassing ten billion by 2059.
Population trends and increasing income levels in many developing countries are driving significant changes in global food demand. Local and increasingly globalized dietary preferences now emphasize higher meat and protein consumption. Global food demand is expected to rise between 59 percent and 98 percent by 2050. Particularly, demand for animal calorie-rich foods is projected to increase between 61 percent and 144 percent from 2005 to 2050, influenced mainly by evolving preferences in the demand system and disparities in income levels and price increases.
The population of Pakistan stood at 242.8 million in January 2024. Data shows that Pakistan's population increased by 4.7 million (+2.0 percent) between early 2023 and the start of 2024. The phenomenal and unprecedented increase in population is another major factor for climate change. To prevent the dangerous effects of climate change, Pakistan must make serious efforts to control its population growth.
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the impact of climate change is reducing crop yields (particularly cereals) in certain regions of the world and is disrupting water resources. In South Asia, for example, forward analyses show that without appropriate adaptation measures, by 2050, cereal production will drop by between 20 to 50 percent due to climate change, potentially associated with food shortages. These trends are expected to continue in the coming years. By affecting harvests, climate change could also increase the price volatility of agricultural products and make foods less nutritious and healthy.
Developing countries acknowledge these forecasts, reflected in every African country prioritizing the agriculture sector in their climate change adaptation strategies under the Paris Agreement’s Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs). Some 58 percent of countries have set a specific target for the agriculture sector in their greenhouse gas emission reduction targets (mitigation).
In addressing climate change, agriculture can serve as a catalyst for solutions by promoting techniques that yield co-benefits in terms of adaptation, mitigation, and increased food production. One approach is to advocate for practices like agro-ecology. A paradigm shift towards more sustainable and productive agricultural and food systems is crucial. This shift is particularly important because farmers who adapt their crop systems to climate change generally experience reduced vulnerability to food insecurity and poverty. Farmers are challenged to minimize the use of natural resources in their sector while maintaining yields and reducing inputs to sustainably preserve these resources.

The author serves as an English Language and World History teacher and holds the position of Head of the English Department at Headstart School. Additionally, they work as a teacher and trainer for GRE and SAT at the United States Educational Foundation in Islamabad.
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