Voice of climate-by Naseem Sheikh

Noise has become a very important "stress factor" in the environment of man. The term "noise pollution" has been recently used to signify the hazard of sounds which are consequence of modern day development, leading to health hazards of different type. Continuous exposure to high decibel noise can result in some adverse effects on your health. One of these hazards is acoustic trauma to the ears caused when they are subjected to the sound of an intensity of 85 dB or more without respite. The health hazards of noise pollution can be categorized into physiological and psychological hazards. While the former includes hearing loss, hypertension, disturbance in sleep patterns etc., the later includes problems such as annoyance, aggression and stress.  According to a medical health guide lines, although high levels of noise for short time can lead to noise induced hearing loss early but usually 10 years of exposure is generally required for significant hearing loss to oc...

Asia, located primarily in the eastern and northern hemispheres, is the world’s largest and most populous continent, Population of Asia 2011 is 3,879,000,000 (3.8 billion). It covers 8.6% of the Earth’s total surface area (or 29.9% of its land area) and with approximately 4 billion people, it hosts 60% of the world’s current human population, But only about 36 percent of the renewable fresh water. So, even on a continental scale, it is clear that water is a serious constraint in Asia. China, India and Pakistan are three of the four top irrigators in the world, suffering with serious water problems. Pakistan has in most areas of agriculture a monsoon climate, and there might be abundant rainfall during the wet season and then a very long dry season where crop production depends very heavily on irrigation water. Groundwater is a very important source of irrigation for farmers. Ground water is being over-pumped extensively in order to meet current demands for food production but if ou...

In Pakistan, the annual mean surface temperature has been  consistently rising trend since the beginning of 20th century. The rise in mean temp. has been  of 0.6-1.0°C in arid coastal areas, arid mountains and hyper arid plains, and there has been a 10-15% decrease in both winter and summer rainfall in the coastal belt and hyper arid plains. There has been an 18-32% increase in rainfall in the monsoon zone especially the sub-humid and humid areas. There is a 5% decrease in relative humidity in Baluchistan, 0.5 to 0.7% Increase in solar radiation over the southern half of the country. These  drastic environmental changes are all due to global warming because of our wasteful  usage of natural resources and an increase in  pollutants that are further causing irreversible changes to our mother land. We must adopt steps like other developed nations to reduce and further overcome these types of problems. In America the National Green Week is the largest waste red...

Aquaponic is a combination of two words, Aqua – water and Ponics-Farm in a box. “Aquaponics an environmentally-friendly, natural food growing method to facilitate the cultivation of fish and plants together in a constructed, re-circulating ecosystem utilizing natural bacterial cycles to convert fish wastes to plant nutrients. “So it is also called as recirculation farming. Recirculation farms are a socially responsible farming method and business too; they support the use of renewable energy, recycle water and waste, and provide local food. Aquaponic systems are much more productive and use up to 90 percent less water than conventional gardens. Other advantages include no weeds, fewer pests, and no watering, fertilizing, bending, digging or heavy lifting etc. there are different types of aquaponic like Media Bed - (using a substance such as lave rocks or other medium other than soil for raising plants and bacteria) Raft - (using foam boards with cut outs to place planter pots floati...

The escalating and inelastic demand for energy to fuel economic activities exerts pressures on its limited supply. The skyrocketing prices of petroleum products results in the depletion of non renewable energy sources and the continued investigation and use of renewable and Innovation results. As authenticated research already have proved that the country’s energy demand is expected to increase three fold by 2050, but supply position is not inspiring in anyway The concept of Using human food as ethanol is on full bloom now a days but environmentalists have warned that the bio fuel craze can do as much or more damage to the environment as dirty fossil fuels, much of the Amazon Rainforest is being destroyed every year to produce bio-fuel crops. So now we see the consequences in Africa. A market has been created by British and EU laws requiring the blending of rising amounts of bio fuels into petrol and diesel. So we must Mangrove forests appear as light beam in such darkening sit...

As stated, Pakistan is one of the lowest contributors to this global problem but, nevertheless, it has played a leading role in trying to formulate global consensus in addressing this issue demanding collective cooperation. Also, the country is cognizant of its development priorities and is actively seeking both, financial and technological support, to place its undeniable future growth on to a low carbon trajectory. Global deforestation and degradation had a negative role towards climate change for which initiatives such as Reduced Emission from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) was important as an alleviation response to climate change. The United Nation Framework Convention of Climate Change (UNFCC) was adopted in 1992 and Pakistan was one of its signatory along with 194 other nations. The study, by researchers at the University of California, Merced, concluded that rising temperatures associated with climate change could result in many more severe forest fires in the coming d...

Pakist­an needs to shift to enviro­nment-friend­ly energy. Pakistan must adopt other technologies for generating power from renewable energy sources, such as municipal waste and landfill methane geothermal recovery, anaerobic biomass gasification, biological fuels, fuel cells and ocean waves. It is no secret that Pakistan is in the grip of a serious energy crisis that is affecting all sectors of the economy and various segments of society. Luckily Pakistan is also blessed with many resources but the government has not focused on alternative energy to the extent that it should, so far. For years, the matter of balancing Pakistan’s supply against the demand for electricity has remained a largely unresolved matter. And it is a separate issue that Pakistan faces a significant challenge in revamping its distribution network as well. A lot of problems arise out of the fact that Pakistan’s energy infrastructure is neither well developed nor well managed. The mismanagement can be gauged from...

Pakistan is under black-outs due  not just because of terrorism, corruption, and inflation. No, mostly it’s  because of electricity and gas shortages and this in long run affects every sector of life which you can imagine. Natural disasters like The Great Earthquake and Flood-2010 have negatively affected our growth rate and a number of energy plants were partially or completely damaged. About 1.4 billion people today lack access to electricity, and current trends indicate that this will not change significantly by 2030. It is also estimated that 2.5 billion people will still use traditional biomass for cooking in 2030, with related health effects leading to 1.5 million premature deaths per year, mostly among women and children. The blame game about electricity and gas shortages is on full throttle here . Some blame the current Pakistani leadership thinking it has only happened recently. Today, Pakistan is in a severe energy crisis   Figure 1: Electricity Status of P...

Pakistan is one of the countries that contributes least to global climate change but, nevertheless, it has played a leading role in trying to formulate global consensus on cooperating to address it .Also, the country is cognizant of its development priorities and is actively seeking both financial and technological suppor, to place its undeniable future growth on to a low carbon trajectory. Global deforestation and degradation accelerated climate change and to counter this, initiatives such as Reduced Emission from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) was important as an alleviation response. The United Nation Framework Convention of Climate Change (UNFCC) was adopted in 1992 and Pakistan was one of its signatory along with 194 other nations. The study, by researchers at the University of California, Merced, concluded that rising temperatures associated with climate change could result in many more severe forest fires in the coming decades. Professor Anthony Westerling and his tea...

Throughout 2011 we have seen  some of the extreme weather effects of climate change stinging. Global warming means killer storms more worse than Katrina and Gustav, unexpected flooding in Asia, drought in Eastern Europe, unseasonal heavy rains in western Africa. These events  have also reduced crop yields, further hampering the chances of relief. 2012 will also be the first year in which the world has had 7 billion mouths to feed throughout all 12 months. But drought in Eastern Europe this winter has affected the grain harvest raising prices and lowering hopes for famine relief in Africa. Global warming is causing the melting of glaciers in the Himalayas. In the short term, this means increased risk of flooding, erosion, mudslides and GLOF in Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and north India during the wet season. Because the melting of snow coincides with the summer monsoon season, any intensification of the monsoon and/or increase in melting is likely to contribute to flood d...