August 28, 2026
Press Release
ISLAMABAD
AGHS Legal Aid Cell, on Friday, organised a high-level panel discussion titled “Living with Floods in Climate Change Present” at a local hotel in Islamabad, which brought together policymakers, academics, climate experts, environmental journalists and civil society representatives to examine Pakistan’s growing vulnerability to floods and the urgent need for more resilient, equitable and effective climate and water governance. The event was organised with the support of the European Union (EU).
The discussion was organised as a follow-up to the sessions on climate change held during the 6th Asma Jahangir Conference 2026 (AJCONF2026) in February this year.
The panel, moderated by senior environmental journalist and climate advocate Afia Salam, brought together Federal Minister for Climate Change and Environmental Coordination Musadik Malik, UNDP Resident Representative in Pakistan Samuel Rizk, Professor of Critical Geography Dr. Daanish Mustafa, hydrology expert Dr. Hassan Abbas, and climate and water governance expert Fazilda Nabeel, among other experts.
The discussion focused on what it means for Pakistan to live with increasingly frequent and devastating floods, and on the practical steps required to protect communities, strengthen disaster preparedness and build long-term climate resilience.
“All talk remains just words”: Musadik Malik
In his remarks, Federal Minister for Climate Change and Environmental Coordination Musadik Malik stressed that despite decades of discussion on climate change, the situation on the ground remains deeply concerning.
“I have been hearing about climate change since 2000, and work on it has been ongoing since the 1980s. With so much discussion around it, I used to think that some improvement must have taken place. But when I look at the reality, nothing seems to be getting any better,” he said.
The Minister noted that Pakistan contributes only around 0.7 to 0.9 percent of global carbon emissions, while a small number of major emitters account for a very substantial share of global emissions. He also highlighted the disparity in access to climate finance.
“It is easily written down that a certain amount of money is needed, but do we actually have the money we require? All the talk we engage in remains just that—mere words. We will have to take practical steps,” Malik said.
Calling for greater innovation and engagement from younger generations, he added, “Try something new. I’m not saying to stop doing what you’re doing – keep doing it. But we don’t know yet how to solve the problems we’ve mentioned. We don’t know how to fight climate change. That’s why we come to you, the young generation.”
Malik also pointed to China as an example of how environmental challenges can be transformed into opportunities, noting the transformation of cities such as Beijing and Shanghai and China’s emergence as a global leader in solar technology and electric vehicles.
Climate change is a present reality
Speaking at the forum, Afia Salam expressed solidarity with communities affected by torrential rains and flooding in Nepal, stressing that recent disasters demonstrate the severe and immediate consequences of climate change.
She urged Pakistan to move beyond reactive responses and take preventive measures and long-term steps to strengthen climate resilience and protect human lives.
Prof. Dr. Daanish Mustafa emphasised that addressing climate change also requires confronting the mindsets and assumptions that shape how societies respond to environmental disasters.
“We will also have to fight against mindsets for climate change; only then can we understand climate change,” he said.
Dr. Mustafa further highlighted the often-overlooked causes of death during floods in Pakistan. He noted that in urban areas, electrocution is a major cause of death, while in rural areas, snakebites represent a significant danger, underscoring the need to integrate emergency medical preparedness into disaster planning.
Glaciers, early warning systems and local knowledge
Hydrology expert Dr. Hassan Abbas drew attention to the complexity of glacier systems and the consequences of human intervention in fragile ecosystems.
“Whenever a glacier melts, it doesn’t check whether there’s a dam in front of it; there are massive boulders inside the rivers, and we ought to think about where they are coming from,” he said.
Dr. Abbas also pointed to the lack of specialised academic study of glaciers in Pakistan, despite the country’s proximity to some of the world’s largest glacier systems. He warned against excessive human interference in fragile glacier ecosystems and stressed the importance of allowing natural systems to follow their course.
Fazilda Nabeel, Climate and Water Governance Expert, stressed the urgency of responding to climate change as a current rather than future challenge.
“Climate change is not a problem of the future, but of the present. When floods strike, they wash away all precautionary measures. We must take concrete actions to effectively mitigate and prevent it,” she said.
Samuel Rizk, UNDP Resident Representative in Pakistan, highlighted the catastrophic impact of the 2022 floods and stressed the importance of strengthening early warning and disaster preparedness systems.
“The catastrophic 2022 floods inflicted immense devastation across Pakistan. To mitigate future risks, leveraging satellite imagery and establishing robust early flood warning systems are vital for timely prevention and disaster response,” he said.
Rizk also raised questions about how much advance warning current systems can realistically provide, noting the challenges involved in predicting the precise timing and intensity of floods, heavy rainfall and glacier melt. He stressed that efforts must ultimately focus on protecting people and safeguarding their fundamental right to safety.
Roundtable: Local communities must be at the centre
The panel discussion was followed by a roundtable bringing together experts, policymakers and climate advocates, including Rina Saeed Khan, environmental journalist and former Chairperson of the Islamabad Wildlife Management Board; Dr. Sobia Rose, researcher at the Ministry of National Food Security and Research; Didar Ali, Associate Director, Climate Forward Pakistan; Dr. Ejaz Tanveer, Superintending Engineer (Floods), Federal Flood Commission; Dr. Muhammad Usman, Manager Research, NDMA; Shafqat Munir, Deputy Executive Director, Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI); Muhammad Fawad, Senior Director, World Wildlife Fund (WWF); and Dr. Muhammad Faisal Ali, Senior Director, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, Ministry of Planning, Development and Special Initiatives.
Rina Saeed Khan spoke about experiences from communities in areas including Gilgit-Baltistan, where local populations have developed their own mechanisms for responding to floods and communicating warnings.
The discussion emphasised the need to strengthen local governments and empower communities as frontline actors in climate adaptation.
Dr. Sobia Rose stressed, “We have to strengthen local governments to tackle climate change. We have to empower local communities to make them more resilient.”
Didar Ali highlighted the challenges faced by Gilgit-Baltistan, including inadequate direct access to funding, limited representation, insufficient resources for early warning systems and the impact of flooding on education.
From hard infrastructure to better governance
Participants agreed that climate change must be treated as a present reality rather than a distant future threat. They emphasised that climate policy and disaster-management responses must incorporate the voices and knowledge of local communities, who are often the first responders during disasters.
There was particular emphasis on the value of indigenous and local knowledge, with participants noting that incorporating such knowledge into climate and development projects can produce more effective and sustainable outcomes.
The participants also discussed lessons from recent disasters in the region, including the disaster in Nepal, and stressed the importance of learning from countries and communities facing similar geographical and climatic conditions. Participants noted the need to prevent settlements in natural pathways and highlighted the importance of effective implementation of existing regulatory mechanisms, including the River Flood Plain Regulation Act, across the country.
The discussion further acknowledged that Pakistan has historically relied heavily on “hard fixes” to address flood risks, but that sustainable climate resilience also requires confronting governance failures. Participants called for a broader assessment of institutional systems through approaches such as SWOT analysis, with particular attention to governance, institutional mechanisms, accountability and coordination.
The AGHS session on floods and climate change resolved that there is an urgent need to decolonise knowledge and practice on floods, with a decolonised engagement with climate change requiring people’s experiential knowledge and practices of adjustment to floods to be placed at the forefront.
The session also recognised that floods can be a blessing rather than a hazard with the right planning and practice.
At the same time, participants expressed their sympathies and solidarity with the people of Nepal and China following the GLOF and the accompanying tragic loss of life, noting that the GLOF in China and Nepal is a wake-up call for Pakistan. They stressed that Pakistan’s glaciers and rivers are at least a hundred times bigger than the stream and the glacier where the GLOF occurred in Tibet and China, and cautioned that the country’s obsession with dams and development policies can accentuate the risk a hundred times.
The session also welcomed the government’s pivot towards improving governance instead of relying on more foreign funding and relief following the 2022 floods.
The event concluded with a shared recognition that Pakistan’s response to climate change must move from discussion to practical, community-centred and accountable action, combining scientific knowledge, indigenous knowledge, effective governance, early warning systems and long-term resilience planning.