ISLAMABAD: The Met Office on Sunday warned residents of Islamabad that the hot weather will last for more than a week.

“We are expecting a wind storm next week, but no rains to cool the temperature in Islamabad,” said Dr Ghulam Rasul, director general of the Pakistan Meteorological Department.

He said the current prolonged intense dry heat spell is unusual and a possible impact of climate change.

He said that Islamabad, which used to be rangeland with small grasses and a few shrubs, has had a history of soaring temperature which used to cross 40°C. In May 1988, the temperature had touched 45.6°C and 46.6°C in 2005 followed by 45°C in July 2012.

“But such warm weather never lasted this long and were usually followed by rain showers,” Dr Rasul said. He said the altering climate is bringing drastic changes to the weather.

“We were seeing people still wearing warmer clothes in April in Islamabad while the heat was breaking records in the same month in the south, in Nawabshah. In just 15 days in May, the weather in Islamabad became extremely warm. The temperature will rise by 1°C in Pakistan by the next decade, with summers longer than nine months,” he said.

The official warned that the impacts of the changing climate include scarcity of water, a threat to food security, high temperature, and “horrible” shrunken winter days and will impact health and mortality rates.

“By the end of this century, the air people breathe will be 2.5°C hotter,” he added.

The only solution to countering the impact of rising temperature is planting more trees, he said.

“If campaigns such as the one in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa can be launched for planting millions of trees and if the saplings are cared for, the temperature can be reduced by a degree within the next decade,” Dr Rasul said.

According to a senior official at the climate change ministry, frequent fires in the Margalla Hills and the failure of the concerned authorities for controlling the fires is destroying the only mechanism that cooled Islamabad.

“Fires breakout every summer and it is shocking that government departments are still not armed with tools to fight the fires,” he said.

He added that Pakistan is among the top ten most vulnerable countries in the world to the impacts of global warming. The official said that responding to the impact of climate change is still not a priority for the present government.

Published in Dawn, June 4th, 2018