Established in 1970, the World Wildlife Fund-Pakistan (WWF-Pakistan) is one of the oldest and most experienced environmental NGOs in the country. It is committed to the conservation of the country’s rich biodiversity and is a part of the global WWF network. Environmentalist Ali Hassan Habib took over as the Chief Executive Officer of WWF-Pakistan when he was only 32 years old and served as its Director General for 19 years. During this time, the programmes of WWF-Pakistan expanded rapidly to increase its conservation efforts. WWF-Pakistan today works through 30 offices with a team of over 500 staff members; it has regional offices in Karachi, Islamabad, Peshawar, Gilgit, Muzaffarabad and Quetta.

This September Ali Habib finally retired, handing over the reins to Hammad Naqi Khan, who had started his career with WWF-Pakistan several years ago, working to establish its water programme and helping to introduce the successful Better Cotton Initiative in Pakistan. This initiative attempts to make global cotton production better for the people who produce it and better for the environment it grows in by using fewer pesticides and less water.

Deforestation is disturbing the ecological balance and pushing a number of animal species to the verge of extinction

One of Hammad’s first tasks upon taking up the new post was to launch WWF’s annual Living Planet Report 2014, which urges Pakistan to protect its biodiversity. The new Director General of WWF-Pakistan explained that he would like the media to play a more active role in highlighting the threats to wildlife in the country, which has become a transit country for wildlife trade and to draw attention to the cause of conservation. According to Hammad, “Pakistan is adversely affected by illegal wildlife trade which has deeply impacted our biodiversity. Smuggling of freshwater turtles, pangolins and black scorpions are a growing concern as are rising rates of deforestation.” These species are mostly smuggled to China and other South East Asian countries where there is a big demand for them to be used in local medicines. Pakistan also has one of the lowest forest covers in the South Asian region at around two or three per cent while countries like Nepal and India have around 25pc of their geographical areas under forests, which is considered the ideal. Increasing deforestation in Pakistan has contributed to increased threats for species such as the common leopard and various types of pheasants.

“Pakistan is adversely affected by illegal wildlife trade which has deeply impacted our biodiversity.”

Deforestation is not just happening in Pakistan, however. It is a global phenomenon and the news from scientists and researchers around the world is certainly alarming — according to this year’s Living Planet report, the global populations of fish, birds, mammals, amphibians and reptiles have declined by 52pc in the 40 years period measured in the current edition. “Put another way, in less than two human generations, population sizes of vertebrate species have dropped by half. These are the living forms that constitute the fabric of the ecosystems which sustain life on Earth — and the barometer of what we are doing to our own planet, our only home. We ignore their decline at our peril” is how the report describes this statistic. The report is the world’s leading, science-based analysis on the health of our planet and the impact of human activity.

The decline of biodiversity in the wider Asia Pacific region ranks only behind Latin America (where vast tracts of the Amazon rainforest have been cut down in recent years). It is an uphill task to save what remains, but as the WWF Founder, Sir Peter Scott, points out: “We can’t save all we’d like to, but we shall save a great deal more than if we had never tried.” The biggest global threats to biodiversity are habitat loss and degradation, fishing and hunting and climate change.

The report also shows ecological footprints (a measure of humanity’s demands on nature) which are continuing its upward climb. According to Hammad, “We are living beyond our planetary boundaries … right now it would take 1.5 planet earths to produce the resources necessary to support our current ecological footprint.” Pakistan’s footprint is still very low; it is in fact near the bottom as we only use up 0.4pc of the planet’s resources. The tiny oil producing (and oil-guzzling) kingdom of Kuwait has the biggest ecological footprint on the planet.

The report is not just full of doom and gloom however; it also notes that the majority of the human population lives in cities and these have the potential to become centres of renewable energy production and energy efficiency which would help bring down carbon emissions and slow down climate change. In fact, the report states as a key priority: “delinking the relationship between footprint and development.” Research presented in the report shows that it is possible to increase living standards while restraining resource use; certainly countries like Sweden have proven that you can bring down carbon emissions and still have increased economic growth. A more hopeful future is possible as we now have the skills and technology to embark on a sustainable, low carbon pathway — what is needed is the political will to do so.

Published in Dawn, Sunday Magazine, October 19th, 2014