According to a report published last Wednesday, Pakistan is grappling with a mix of climate‑related disasters—record heat, melting glaciers, and heavy rains—that is turning what would normally be manageable infrastructure problems into full‑blown humanitarian crises.
Recent deluges have touched roughly 33 million people across the country, left many more without shelter, ruined large swaths of farmland, and taken hundreds of lives, Modern Diplomacy, a Bulgarian‑based outlet, has pointed out.
During the summer, the high‑altitude region of Gilgit‑Baltistan, under Pakistani control, saw a wave of glacial‑lake outburst floods (GLOFs). These sudden releases ripped through several villages, wiping out homes, creating temporary lakes that cut off roads, and disrupting the fragile tourism economy that depends on mountain routes.
The destruction of houses, guesthouses and local economic hubs in these areas underscores how inadequate transport and tourism infrastructure can magnify the damage brought on by glaciers that are shifting under climate stress.
In 2025, the nation also endured intense heatwaves, with many urban centers and plain regions experiencing temperatures far above what the seasons usually bring. April, in particular, was the second hottest month in 65 years, with the national average temperature rising approximately 3.37 °C above historic norms.
“Heat stress has direct impacts on labour productivity, public health and the viability of energy systems, spiking demand at exactly the moment supply is least secure. The return of La Nina this winter poses another test of Pakistan’s resilience, as shifting temperature and rainfall patterns will once again reveal how exposed communities, ecosystems, and infrastructure remain to a changing climate. In short, Pakistan is experiencing compound hazards, heat stress, glacial instability, and unusually intense rainfall that together convert ordinary infrastructure failures into humanitarian catastrophes,” Arooj Saghir wrote in Modern Diplomacy.
“Why do these predictable collisions between people, nature and climate still happen? Why are the same infrastructure fail‑points recurring? What good is growth if it washes away each year? Why villages again suffer loss, why roads wash away, why power systems falter and why communities bear the worst harm? The patterns are familiar: inadequate spatial planning that ignores biodiversity and hydrology, weak enforcement of EIAs and social safeguards, faulty compensation and resettlement processes that leave families poorer and more exposed, and infrastructure designed to historical standards rather than future climates,” she added.
As rainfall intensifies, drainage networks break and bridges give way. Hydraulic structures—such as culverts and flood bypasses—are undersized, and embankments along rivers like the Chenab, Sutlej and Ravi fail because they were not updated to accommodate new flow regimes, increased glacial melt, or the heightened rainfall brought on by La Nina cycles.
“Since most of the infrastructure is still built with the old climate baseline in mind, monsoon design storms, flood embankments, drainage systems calibrated for decades‑old rainfall intensities. As rainfall intensifies, drainage and bridges collapse; hydraulic structures (culverts, flood bypasses) are undersized. Embankments along rivers like the Chenab, Ravi and Sutlej are overtopped or breached because they were not upgraded to accommodate altered flow regimes, upstream glacial melt, or enhanced rainfall due to La Nina cycles.”
“Recent floods showed how urban drainage systems and river embankments, often built or altered without integrated watershed assessments, were overwhelmed. Releases from upstream reservoirs and poorly coordinated transboundary water management also amplified downstream impacts. Building dams and roads without resilience is no longer progress; it is policy myopia. Where accountability is thin and safeguards are procedural rather than substantive, projects proceed on convenience rather than resilience, and the poorest pay the price,” the report noted.
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