Imagine living in a place, where every breath you take silently puts your health at risk. That’s reality for millions of residents of Punjab, particularly Lahore and Multan.
Within the past month alone, close to two million people visited hospitals complaining breathing difficulties, asthma, chest infections, eye irritation, and heart complications. This forced the government to declare smog a “health crisis” due to its severe effects.
Lahore remained appalling high pollution level as PM2.5 crossed 400 µg/m³ suggesting hazardous conditions. The level of pollution hits the heights in November rising even more than hazardous markers some of which stood at 1,600 AQI. This crisis is caused by crop residue burning, automobiles emissions and pollutants from industries.
Multan has also witnessed a record high pollution level where the AQI has crossed mark 2000 several times. These figures alarm us to identify the causes in order to find out long term solutions to overcome the issue of toxic air quality in these cities.
Islamabad air quality was also not very good. The city had 3 days with PM2.5 concentrations within the range of 200-300µg/m³ with several other days that can be considered moderately polluted. More precisely, 6 disturbing days were ranging AQI between 175 and 200, 4 days had AQI ranging between 150 and 175 and also 4 days with AQI ranging between 125 and 150. Consequently, only 2 days showed its variation within the range of 100–125 µg/m³, which also points to a constant problem of excessive air pollution.
During the month, Karachi’s air quality was moderate with PM2.5 ranging from 75-200 µg/m³. More specifically, 8 days were found to have PM2.5 equal or above 75 to 100 µg/m³, 1 day in each of the 150 to 175 and above of 175 to 200 µg/m³ respectively, depicting comparatively fewer days with extremely polluted environment.
Recently on November 15th, 2024 the government of Punjab, conducted an artificial rain to deal with the eminent pollutant level. Before rain, cities such as Lahore and Multan complained about smog with Lahore AQI reading touching the very unhealthy range. However, there was a lot of improvement in the air quality after the artificial rain was carried out in these cities.
On Sunday, November 17th, the AQI in Lahore was 297 and the AQI in Multan was 230, this is much lower than the earlier hazardous ratings. This was the second time for the Punjab government to conduct artificial rain with the intention to enhance the air quality. Lahore was also target of a successful cloud seeding exercise in the previous year during the month of December.
The relationship between air pollution and the population density is also observable in Pakistan’s urbanizing areas. Lahore is a large city with a population of approximately 14.4 million, and its air quality is very poor, with AQI up to 1,600 due to car emissions, crop burning and factories, according to data.
Peshawar has a population of 2,481,000 and it also experiences a high AQI; a level that is more than 150 because of cars emissions and small industries. Steady traffic and aged vehicles are choking Karachi, the most populous metropolis with 17.6 million people, which recorded a relatively low AQI as compared to Lahore. It benefits from its coastal location which allows the sea breezes to disperse the air pollutants.
The city of Islamabad has a population of 1.27 million with its AQI at 124; it is worsened by growth in car usage and urbanization. Quetta, home to 1.22 million people, has PM2.5 above 200 in winters, largely caused by the combustion of coal for warmth.
Pakistan is currently facing toxic air situation and a debate is underway how to overcome this problem. There are several examples across the world to improve the air quality. Japan is a good example of how transport emissions can be reduced despite a high population density and high levels of urbanization. Japan has more than 126 million inhabitants and the country introduced environment friendly transport policies to address the issue of environment.
The high volume rail especially, The Shinkansen (Bullet Train), which transports about one million people daily, produces 90% less carbon dioxide per km compared to private automobiles. Also, Japan has over 300000 EV charging stations to help facilitate its transition to EV and HEVs.
In short, climate-change issue does not respect state-boundaries hence requires concerted efforts of all countries to address it. Pakistan’s Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif expressed that as minimal emitters, countries like Pakistan should not bear the brunt of emissions caused by others, particularly without the necessary tools to finance climate resilience. He stressed in COP29, “Without climate justice, there can be no real resilience, and I don’t want other countries to face the plight Pakistan endured in 2022,” referring to the devastating floods that heavily impacted the country.
