ISLAMABAD: The United Nations Enviro­n­ment Programme (UNEP) will open its office in Pakistan very soon to lead the Living Indus Initiative programme for which the UNEP and the government are in negotiations with the Green Climate Fund (GCF) for an indicative funding of $25 million.

The Living Indus is an umbrella initiative and a call for action to lead and consolidate initiatives to restore the ecological health of the Indus within the boundaries of Pakistan, which is the most vulnerable to climate change.

In order to tackle the brunt of extreme climate events, the ministry of climate change, led by Minister Sherry Rehman, has prepared a resilience plan that contains multifarious interventions to enhance the country’s resilience and adaptation to climate change.

UNEP Executive Director Inger Andersen, who is on a week-long visit to Pakistan for discussions with officials of ministries and stakeholders concerned, told Dawn that UNEP would open its office in Pakistan very soon to help the government implement the Living Indus Initiative project.

The Indus initiative is part of the assistance sought by the government at Geneva conference last month.

In the aftermath of 2022 floods, Pakistan and the Indus Basin are on the frontline of climate change. Pakistan and the Indus Basin were also on the frontline of nature and biodiversity loss, she said.

“The impact of 2022 floods in Pakistan was incredibly hard. The trajectory of climate impact in disaster was greater with greater frequency across the scale, and Pakistan unfortunately is on the frontline of this. What we saw in Pakistan is an unpredictable and unseasonal flooding event with intensity of ferocity,” she said.

She lauded the role being played by Pakistan at UNEP, and mentioned that Minister Sherry Rehman was Vice President of UN Environment Assembly and was actively participating in the governance of oversight as to how the decisions that member states take, were implemented.

The UNEP executive director said that the intergovernmental negotiating committee to develop an international legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment, it was expected to conclude negotiations by the end of 2024.

Published in Dawn, February 6th, 2023