ISLAMABAD, Oct 13 (NNN-APP) – Pakistan’s Minister for Climate Change, Sherry Rehman, said yesterday that, the country’s devastating floods is one of the biggest climate tragedies of the century that the world has ever witnessed.
The floods have killed more than 1,700 people and affected over 33 million others.
“The rescue mission has now stopped, but we are still in the longest relief operation any country has ever seen,” the climate minister said, adding that, an estimated 20.6 million people are still in need of help.
She said that, the floods have caused damages of more than 40 billion U.S. dollars, as estimated by the World Bank, fearing that the actual losses and damages are much higher than estimated, and will increase with time.
The situation is grim in the country’s southern Sindh and south-west Balochistan provinces, as stagnant floodwater inundated 11 districts, making humanitarian relief an enormous challenge, Rehman said.
Over nine million acres of standing crops are damaged and inundated, and this will directly put 14.6 million people in the line of a food and agriculture crisis, the minister said, adding that, Pakistan’s export crops are almost all wiped out, and the country will even need to import food after the flood.
Rehman said that, an additional 15.4 million more people in Pakistan are expected to be pushed below the poverty line, due to the recent climate-induced floods.– NNN-APP
