STAFF REPORT IBD: Pakistan has been ranked amongst the 20 most climate-vulnerable countries worldwide, reveals Maplecroft, a British risk assessment consultancy, that ranks countries by their expected climate vulnerability over the next 30 years.
“Bangladesh is more vulnerable than its neighbours such as India, Pakistan and Nepal, who ranked 7, 14 and 16 respectively,” the report recently released here says.
Malik Amin Aslam Khan, a former minister of state for environment, is of the view that estimating the actual economic costs of adaptation, “is still a nascent concept at the global level, with a plethora of techniques floating around but none accepted as the norm.”
However, there is a consensus that impact costs for the South Asian region will be very high and that the infrastructure sector would be the most affected by climate change.
It comes as no surprise that cost estimates for bearing the brunt of future climate impacts are in the range of $6 to $14 billion per year for Pakistan over the next 40 years” as suggested by a UN sponsored study.
And this figure will rise with the passage of time as adaptation becomes more expensive and the country confronts unavoidable damages.