Yellen’s message to Pakistan and the Global South is ominous: You are on your own.
Much of southern Asia is enveloped in a sprawling “spring” heatwave. Again. Temperatures in Bangladesh, China, India, Laos, Myanmar, and Thailand exceeded 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Extreme heat is the new normal. Maximiliano Herrera, a climatologist and weather historian, described the unusually high temperatures as the “worst April heatwave in Asian history.”
Extreme heat is the new normal. And as the monsoon season unfolds, so will the droughts and typhoons that will batter the region.
Consider last year’s floods in Pakistan that affected 33 million people. The human impact was devastating. 1,730 people were killed, two million houses were destroyed, and 22,000 schools were damaged; the national poverty rate is expected to increase by four percent.
To use the language more familiar to corporate and multilateral sustainability executives, the floods in Pakistan negatively affected five of the UNDP 17 Sustainable Development Goals: 9 million Pakistanis were pushed into poverty (UNDP goal 1); 7.6 million now face increase food insecurity (UNDP goal 2); 17 million women and children face a greater risk of disease (UNDP goal 3); 640,000 women are at greater risk of gender-related violence (UNDP goal 5); and 4.3 million have seen their jobs and means of economic livelihood disturbed (UNDP goal 8).
The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction calls it “the invisible toll of disasters.” That is misleading. The floods were hardly invisible to the 33 million Pakistanis affected.
Ignorance is bliss
The United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction calls it “the invisible toll of disasters.” That is misleading. The floods were hardly invisible to the 33 million Pakistanis affected. A more apt name would have been “the ignored toll of the disaster.”
To make matters worse, we are meticulously recording this growing human toll. The World Bank has developed a core diagnostic report that integrates climate change and development considerations called Country Climate and Development Reports (CCDRs).
Perhaps Pakistan is the best example of what the World Bank calls the climate “risk multiplier.” The total damage of last year’s floods was equivalent to 4.8 percent of the country’s GDP, while recovery and reconstruction needs are projected to be 1.6 times the budget for total national development in 2023.
A 16-point plan but no money
And remember, this is just one disaster, in one year, in one country, in a world where climate “physical risk” is getting more extreme with each tick up in the temperature of the earth’s atmosphere.
And it’s not that we are at a loss on what to do. For Pakistan, the World Bank has developed a detailed 16-point plan to mitigate climate change while meeting human capital, growth, and natural capital priorities.
But there is one slight problem. No one wants to pay the $348 billion in public and private financing over the next seven years that the World Bank estimates will be needed for Pakistan to implement the recommendations.
If Pakistan took on the bulk of the cost, it would immediately imperil decades of hard-fought economic progress. Funding climate resilience would require raising taxes on food, fuel, and fertilizer, which would most likely trigger an intense political backlash.
But don’t look to the Global North for any immediate help. Despite headline-grabbing announcements at last year’s UN climate conference (COP 27) for a “historical” loss and damage fund climate projects, not a single dollar has been allocated. Instead, global leaders have agreed to form a committee.
Despite headline-grabbing announcements at last year’s UN climate conference (COP 27) for a “historical” loss and damage fund climate projects, not a single dollar has been allocated.
So, to review the cards: In the past 20 years, funding needs for extreme weather events increased by 800 percent globally. In more than 100 Global South nations, 3.6 billion people face similar climate challenges. By 2030, estimates predict loss and damage costs will range from $290 billion to $580 billion annually. Worse, the impact of climate change is not linear with temperature rise; it becomes exponentially worse with each fraction of a degree of warming.
What loss and damage?
But if history is any guide, don’t hold your breath for any meaningful relief from the world’s richest countries. Billions of “loss and damage” funds will be pledged in sparkly press releases, but promises will not be kept. Last month, U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told U.S. lawmakers that she wants World Bank reforms to vastly expand lending to fight climate change and other global crises, but she refused to consider increasing U.S. funding to the World Bank. Instead, she told the bank to stretch existing resources, adopt innovative financing policies, and mobilize private finance.
That’s a bit like telling someone who has just lost their house in a hurricane to dip into their own personal savings, sell the family silver, and beg relatives and friends for money.
Yellen’s message to Pakistan and the Global South is ominous: You are on your own.
Sorry, Pakistan. The North has another priority: itself. But please don’t take it personally. It’s business.
