Nation’s Outlook for National Resilience Day 2021
OCTOBER 8 was the sixteenth anniversary of the 2005 Kashmir earthquake, one of Pakistan’s worst ever natural disasters.
The day is hence observed every year as National Resilience Day, dedicated to waking Pakistan up to the need to become resilient towards the disasters that often strike it.
On this occasion, we were woken up to the need for resilience in a much rougher way. Just the day before October 8, a magnitude 5.9 earthquake struck Balochistan, affecting mostly the district of Harnai.
Despite the small scale of the emergency, the national response has been very difficult. Rescuers were slow in reaching and evacuating the affected area due to its remoteness.
Power outage caused by the quake forced doctors in local hospitals to work by phone torchlight. Excavating victims from collapsed structures proceeded slowly.
The most alarming situation was with the coal mines, in which people were already working at three in the morning when the earthquake struck.
Four coal miners were soon confirmed dead. Officials said early on that 15 people were trapped in one collapsed mine. But since then, updates have not been given on that situation.
Such a thing ought to have been the centre of national attention at the moment. Lack of clarity seems to be part of this disaster. The recent earthquake is a reminder that resilience continues to be lacking in Pakistan.
That has been painfully clear for a long time, as recovery from the Kashmir earthquake is still not complete after 16 years.
Many schools in the affected area are yet to be rebuilt. Yet, this National Resilience Day comes at a time when resilience is more important than ever, because humanitarian crises and threats are now pervasive.
Pakistan, in fact, may have just narrowly avoided an unspeakable catastrophe. The monsoon season ended with a late withdrawal on October 6.
But since 2021 began, there were several warning signs this monsoon would have the potential to produce very large-scale flooding in Pakistan, perhaps even matching the “super-flood” of 2010. It was Pakistan’s worst-ever flood season, while the second-worst followed right after in 2011.
Many meteorological conditions in both 2010 and 2011 that were linked to Pakistan’s floods have also been present in 2021, as noted by my NGO Pakistan’s People-Led Disaster Management But the season has passed without any extraordinary incident, only scattered incidents of damage from heavy rainfall.
I would attribute this to pure chance, as even a slight factor being off can mean major differences in the outcome of weather.
Disaster of a contrary kind was also dodged. After a normal July, monsoon rainfall was far below average in August (the main month for rainfall), creating widespread drought conditions.
In areas like Tharparkar, August’s rain deficit would have led to a devastating drought were it not for moderately above-average rainfall in September turning things around.
It brought relief across the nation, although water stress continues in Balochistan and water levels in Mangla and Tarbela reservoirs are left far below usual because of this year’s overall dearth of monsoon rain. On the whole, though, this monsoon was none too harsh.
The country, however, is still struggling because of the coronavirus pandemic, which continues to rage worldwide.
Most countries like Pakistan are very far from achieving full vaccine coverage, while mutated variants are making the pandemic worse. The virus is changing in so many ways that we may have no idea what form it ultimately takes.
And the coming of winter in the northern hemisphere plus worldwide prevalence of Delta variant may soon prove to be a catastrophic combination, affecting numerous countries as badly as India was last Spring.
Pakistan, which has already lost 28,000 people to COVID-19, also has much else to watch out for.
In the monsoon’s wake, alarming outbreaks of various diseases like dengue, typhoid, and malaria are occurring across the country.
Cases are filling up hospitals in many cities, putting further strain on a healthcare system already burdened by the Covid-19 pandemic.
The risk of severe weather also continues to be greater than ever before as the climate crisis picks up.
Pakistan is likely to continue experiencing its share of such events. Perhaps a super-flood will indeed materialize next summer.
For now, we have a potentially hazardous cyclone season to worry about. Arabian Sea cyclone activity has risen sharply in recent years, especially in the post-monsoon cyclone season.
That season has already gotten off to an incredible start this year with Cyclone Gulab/Shaheen’s unusual behaviour, including forming before withdrawal of the monsoon.
This may signal a highly active and aberrant cyclone season ahead, so Pakistan should watch out.
We must also watch out for the desert locusts still infesting nearby countries to the west. Though they have been absent from Pakistan for a year, they could return any time, as unusually wet weather patterns continue to feed the upsurge.
Most recently, Cyclone Shaheen, the first major cyclone known to make landfall in the Gulf of Oman, brought huge amounts of flooding to the Arabian Peninsula, which could lead to another explosion of locust populations.
In these circumstances that Pakistan has found itself in, the significance of National Resilience Day in 2021 is that resilience is now an urgent necessity for the nation. We no longer just need disaster preparedness as a safeguard against possible future eventualities.
If we don’t meet the challenges of today, Pakistan will decline as a nation. It is time we adapt and swiftly improve our crisis management capabilities.
—The writer is Director at Pakistan’s People Led Disaster Management.
