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PESHAWAR, Jun 04 (APP):Every year, World Environment Day is being celebrated with a renewed pledge to create awareness among masses on nature issues and sensitize them against the adverse effects of climate change, deforestation, biodiversity loss and desertification which are posing serious challenges to the food security and existence of living creatures.
Besides environmentalists, foresters and wildlife experts, the civil society, intelligentsia, nature clubs and educational institutes have planned special programs in KP to highlight the significance of pollution free environment, and the negative effects of desertification and climate change on the living creatures.
This year’s theme of the World Environment Day is ‘land degradation, desertification and drought resilience.”
According to the UN Convention to Combat Desertification, up to 40 per cent of the planet’s land is degraded, directly affecting half of the world’s population in globe.
Likewise, the number and duration of droughts had also increased by 29 per cent since 2000 which may affect over three-quarters of the world’s population by 2050.
“Pakistan is also confronted to the monster challenge of desertification and prolonged droughts. A visitor could easily see the damages of desertification and drought at Swabi, Mardna, Nowshera, Peshawar, Kohat, Karak, DI Khan and Lakki Marwat while travelling on Islamabad-Peshawar motorway and Indus Highway,” said Niaz Ali, former Chief Conservator of Forests KP while talking to APP.
“This earth is our home. From the day we are born till the day we die, this earth nurtures living creatures and makes us the person we become,” he said, adding protection of earth from environmental challenges should be our collective responsibility.
“The nature is always nourishing and loving besides provides us with all the resources we need for living and necessary for our wellbeing. For both physical and mental wellness, nature provide us with the best of everything for survival and it is our prime duty to conserve water, forests and biodiversity for future generation.
On June 5, 1972, the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment was held at Stockholm in Sweden. Honoring the day, in 1973, the world celebrated its first World Environment Day and since then, the special day is observed on the same day across the world including Pakistan.
Niaz Ali said that land degradation and desertification mostly caused by climate change-weather patterns has been emerged as big challenge before regional countries including Pakistan to counter.
Declaring desertification and land degradation are major threats to food security, he said that desertification turned fertile land barren and unproductive due persistent drought and extreme weather conditions including flooding and torrential rains.
Every year, he claimed that the drought, desertification and land degradation made around six million hectares of land unproductive and cause about USD 42 billion economic losses globally that might lead to starvation and hunger due to water scarcity in next few decades if not controlled properly.
The United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD) report revealed that more than 3.2 billion people, or two in every five, are affected by land degradation and desertification and up to 143 million could move within their countries by 2050 to escape water scarcity and falling crop productivity mainly caused by climate change.
Also, the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) had disclosed that the planet would reach a 1.5C increase in temperatures by 2030, leading to extreme drought, food shortage and floods.
The Ex Forest Chief said about 45 percent of food consumed globally comes from the world’s drylands and falling of agriculture productivity, food shortages and water scarcity in South Asia were likely to create food insecurity.
He warned that about 20 percent more productive land was likely to be degraded in South Asia in the next few decades if desertification and floods were not controlled.
Professor Dr Muhammad Nafees of the Environmental Sciences Department, University of Peshawar said that Pakistan was among 110 countries in the world where about two-third of agricultural land and around 80 percent of arid and semi-arid lands were affected by land-degradation, desertification and drought.
He said our population was increasing with over two percent growth rate that started exerting extra pressure on agriculture, houses and other socioeconomic sectors.
He feared that the country might face food’s insecurity challenges in next few decades if the existing population continues with such high rate and the climate change issue was not addressed on priority basis.
The Sustainable Land Management Program (SLMP-Phase II), a project of Ministry of Climate Change data revealed that around 1.5 to 2.5 million hectares of irrigated land, 3.5 to 4 million hectares of rain-fed agricultural, and 35 million hectares of rangelands were either becoming barren or non-productive due to desertification, land degradation and drought per year.
The underground water resources in the western dry mountains of Sindh and Balochistan are shrinking due to heavy exploitation of aquifer without any natural recharge besides excessive car washing pumping.
Dr Nafees said the lowing laying areas in Balochistan, Sindh, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Punjab located directly on banks of rivers were facing increased problems of land degradation due to climate change impacts, floods, improper land use practices, over-grazing, deforestation and excessive removal of vegetation for fuel.
He said the unlawful cuttings of forests by local communities for domestic consumption, timber mafia and conversion of agriculture land into residential colonies have aggravated the problem of desertification and land degradation.
He said the rate of deforestation nationally was about 27,000 hectare per year especially in community owned natural forests of KP and Gilgit-Baltistan, resulting an increase in dry-land areas and conversion of agricultural lands into deserts.
To combat desertification, land degradation and drought, he said sustainable land nanagment project (SLMP) Phase-I was launched in nine dry-land districts of Pakistan where over 12,000 hectares of degraded rangeland were rehabilitated though reseeding and community based restoration of the grazing management system.
Similarly, around 8,000 hectares of additional land were brought under sustainable rain-fed agriculture and water conservation measures.
Following successful implementation of SLMP Phase-I, the project was later extended to 14 desertification prone districts under SLMP Phase-II in 2015 to protect the fertile land from being converted into deserts.
The project was implemented in high desertification and land degradation prone areas of Chakwal, Bhakkar, Khushab, Layyah in Punjab, Tharparkar, Omarkot, Sanghar in Sindh, DI Khan, Lakki Marwat in KP, Pashin, Kila Saifullah, Mastung, Katch and Lasbella in Balochistan.
Project Director, billion trees afforestration project Diyar Khan said to counter land degradation, desertification and drought on basis of scientific management, KP’s first Range Management Policy “REDD+” (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation) strategy and Green Growth Initiative (GGI) was implemented, which are showing tangible results.
He said that billion trees plus program was being launched for sustainable conservation of forests imperative to combat desertification and droughts in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa.