The Pakistani government reportedly plans to plant 10 billion trees within the next five years to fight climate change.
NBC News reported that former cricketer and recently elected Prime Minister Imran Khan will be tackling the issue of restoring Pakistan’s depleted forests on the heels of his victory last month in the country’s election.
Though Khan’s plan to combat the effects of global warming in the country was not reportedly a major issue in his campaign as the country grapples with terror attacks, the impacts of climate change, including rising temperatures and major flooding, have reportedly cost the country $6 billion to $14 billion in economic recovery and relief.
“It is now imperative to tackle climate change and reverse environmental degradation, as Pakistan’s situation will only worsen as the economy grows,” Khan’s PTI party said in its manifesto.
{mosads}According to the Sustainable Development Policy Institute, Pakistan is the world’s seventh most vulnerable country to climate change despite being among the world’s least polluting countries, with a global emission contribution of 0.2 percent.
The country also reportedly loses dozens of lives annually due to the extreme temperatures and monsoon floods, according to a recent report released by climate technology expert Qamar-Uz-Zaman Chaudhry.
“We have been consumed for so long by so many other challenges such as the war on terror that has engulfed our cities, suicide bombings, public health, that kind of thing,” Ali Tauqeer Sheikh, founder and CEO of environmental think tank LEAD Pakistan, told NBC News.
“But it is extremely important also that we ensure we have enough fresh water and that our development does not destroy our own coastline. We have one of the largest deltas in the world, but it is dying because of climate change,” he added.