‘Pakistan received inadequate funds against climate financing’

Islamabad : Idrees Mahsud, Member, Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA), has said that we need to work together to further the agenda of WASH (water, sanitation and hygiene).

Mr Mahsud was speaking at a panel discussion following a launching of research-based “Climate financing for WASH brief – Pakistan scoping brief” undertaken by IRC researchers led by Habib-ur-Rehman here at a ceremony jointly organised by the IRC and the Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI). The study calls upon international donors to allocate at least 35% of climate-related budget for WASH raising it from the existing 22% for Pakistan and prioritise allocation of WASH and climate-related funding to the countries which are currently unlikely to achieve the WASH SDGs.

Mr Mahsud stressed on focusing implementation rather than making new policies. He urged donors to engage with stakeholders on estimating the need and improving research to support our financing proposals.

In her welcome remarks, the IRC Country Director Shabnam Baloch opined that WASH is critical entry point to reducing community vulnerability to climate impacts, closing gender gaps, health and education disparity, economic inclusion and progress. Climate resilient WASH goes beyond climate infrastructure and is critical in climate induced disasters, she continued. She further noted that while Pakistan needs $7-14 billion annually till 2050 for adaptation alone, there is a dire need to address impediments such as complexity of process in accessing climate financing by CSOs, resource intensive nature of issue and lack of community engagement during project development.

Dr Shafqat Munir from SDPI said that despite constraints in accessing climate financing from multilateral donors, bilateral partnerships and private sector organisations, both the governmental and non-governmental in Pakistan were struggling to get the country’s share in highly competitive climate financing market amid cumbersome processes.

He noted that the funding Pakistan received is inadequate against Pakistan’s climate financing requirements which run in billions of dollars annually.

WASH Expert, Niazullah Khan said that WASH as a sector so far was not aligned with climate agenda due to absence of a consortium that can enable national subnational coordination and anchor the formalisation and legislative review. Climate analyst Dr Fahad Saeed said that we need introspection to see flaws in our policies. Compared to the regional members, Pakistan is lagging in securing climate financing. He stressed on building strong climate rationale to present bankable projects to international financing institutions.

Ali Tauqeer Shaikh Consultant, World Bank, was of the view that we need to revisit our development paradigm because we cannot have a baseline for resilience in the absence of a local adaptation plan. He said that we must improve understanding on international financing which is very competitive. Country Director, WaterAid Pakistan, Arif Jabbar Khan stressed that we need to increase awareness on financial losses due to poor WASH conditions at household level. He said that funds acquired are not properly spent which demonstrates the low absorption capacity within CSOs, and at government level. He suggested that while water scarcity is being flagged, quality must also be prioritised.