Awareness of Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation at Local Level in Punjab, Pakistan
Climate change awareness is an imperative to achieve sustainability in developing countries. Lack of awareness is a significant barrier to climate change adaptation in developing countries. Raising climate change awareness at the local level is critical f
- PDF / 597,301 Bytes
- 20 Pages / 439.37 x 666.14 pts Page_size
- 2 Downloads / 189 Views
Awareness of Climate Change Impacts and Adaptation at Local Level in Punjab, Pakistan Zareen Shahid and Awais Piracha
Abstract Climate change awareness is an imperative to achieve sustainability in developing countries. Lack of awareness is a significant barrier to climate change adaptation in developing countries. Raising climate change awareness at the local level is critical for Pakistan as climate change impacts are exacerbating the number and extent of disasters in this disaster-prone country. Pakistan’s vulnerability to climate change impacts is very high (ranked 12th in the world). This research assesses the awareness of climate change impacts among the local planning officials in Punjab, Pakistan. The research contextualises its findings in the context of Pakistan’s resilience to deal with the adverse impacts of climate change given its unique and unusual set of socio-political circumstances. The findings of this chapter are based on a detailed survey conducted with local planning officials of Lahore, Pakistan. The survey explores the level of awareness of climate change, its causes and impacts in Pakistan. The survey and subsequent analysis in particular focuses on the potential role of use of Geographical Information System (GIS) in raising climate change awareness. Keywords Climate change awareness • Impacts and adaptation • Geographical information system
Z. Shahid University of Engineering & Technology Lahore, Lahore, Pakistan A. Piracha (*) Geographies and Urban Studies Department, Western Sydney University, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith, NSW 2751, Australia e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2016 B. Maheshwari et al. (eds.), Balanced Urban Development: Options and Strategies for Liveable Cities, Water Science and Technology Library 72, DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-28112-4_25
409
410
25.1
Z. Shahid and A. Piracha
Introduction
Climate change is the most serious global environmental issue of the present time. It is a serious threat to the security and prosperity of the world in the twenty-first century. Increased awareness assists in preparing and implementing climate change adaptation measures, such as adjustments in natural and manmade systems to reduce the likely impacts of climate change. Raising climate change awareness at the local government level is critical for Pakistan as climate change impacts are exacerbating the number and extent of disasters in this disaster-prone country. According to a recently published index, Pakistan was ranked 12th on the list of countries most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change (IUCN 2009a). This chapter provides an in-depth analysis of the survey conducted with 150 Union Council local officials of Lahore. This survey attempts to determine the level of climate change awareness among the local officials. Climate change is a broad term and has been researched widely in many disciplines. However, the major focus of climate change research has usually been on scientific analysis and its implications and overlooks the human dimension of climate change im
Data Loading...
