Daily Times

Cyclone Biparjoy is likely to intensify into an extremely severe cyclonic storm and is now less than 910 km away from Karachi. While there is uncertainty about its exact route, with some reporting landfall around the Makran-north Oman coast and others indicating its movement towards the Sindh-Indian Gujrat coastline, authorities in Sindh and Balochistan are now on high alert in anticipation of its arrival. This is the second cyclone to form within three weeks in the North Indian Ocean-Cyclone Mocha, which formed in the Bay of Bengal, barrelled into Bangladesh and Myanmar, causing massive destruction just weeks earlier.

These last few years, both the Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal have been about a degree warmer than usual, creating the perfect breeding environment for tropical cyclone winds and rainfall. While this is a global phenomenon, it is especially true for the Indian Ocean, the warmest of all five oceans, partly because the African-Asian landmass obstructs the entry of cold water from the Arctic. In fact, the North Indian Ocean accounts for 7% of the world’s cyclones, and their impact is made worse due to a high population density clustered around low-lying areas along these coastlines.

Till recently, the Arabian Sea has largely been spared the devastation and wreckage that comes with severe cyclones but that is no longer the case, with climate scientists reporting a massive increase during the pre- and post-monsoon seasons. South Asia is officially in the eye of the storm.

Across Bangladesh, Nepal, India and Pakistan, climate shocks are undoing decades of developmental growth. In each country, the poor and vulnerable are disproportionately impacted while adaptation and resilience-building efforts need to expand rapidly. In a region plagued by cyclones and monsoon rains, investments to protect from flooding and to ensure adequate freshwater supplies are imperative to create mechanisms for withstanding climate shocks-that means increasing domestic and international investment in roads, hydropower dams and coastal communities. It is high time our policymakers start giving serious thought to creating synergies between adaptation and development-climate resilience is the future. Without it, there is a strong possibility that we might just lose it all. *