In Geneva to agree recovery plan following ‘monsoon on steroids’ International funders join Pakistan PM and UN secretary general.
UN secretary general António Guterres as a “monsoon on steroids.” described the international community has promised more than $9bn (£7.4bn) to help Pakistan rebuild after last summer’s catastrophic floods.
At the International Conference on Climate Resilient Pakistan in Geneva, Switzerland. The pledges were made on Monday, hosted by Pakistan’s prime minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif and Guterres. Sharif has said Pakistan needs a minimum of $16.3bn over the next three years to begin recovery and reconstruction, half of which will be met by domestic resources.
Other contributors included the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, Saudi Arabia, the EU, Japan and China. The largest commitment on Monday $4.2bn came from the Islamic Development Bank Group. World Bank vice-president for South Asia, Martin Raiser, announced a $2bn contribution.
one-third of the country submerging by heavy rains which started in June last year and continued until August caused Pakistan’s worst ever flooding. Resulting in a food crisis and huge financial losses more than 4 million acres of agricultural land were inundated.
Leaving 8 million homeless the disaster affected at least 33 million people, killing more than 17,000. Women and children were particularly badly affected. According to Unicef, up to 4 million children are still living near contaminated and stagnant flood waters. The charity reported on Monday between July and December 2022 the number of children suffering from severe acute malnutrition in flood-affected areas nearly doubled, compared with the same period in 2021. It also said that the number of acute respiratory infections among children has soared in flood-stricken areas.
On Monday, with malaria positivity rates running at 50% in Sindh and eastern Balochistan in December, Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) warned that it was seeing alarming health issues in flood-hit areas, despite the colder season, when malaria infections would be expected to decline.