Nations across the globe are continuously facing economic and social risks due to climate change. Extreme weather events, as a consequence of climate change, have led to 495,000 human deaths in the world from 1999 to 2018. In the year 2017, around seven million people, because of extreme climate events, were forced to be displaced in India, Bangladesh and Nepal. It cannot be denied that there has been an exponential rise in the frequency and intensity of extreme events in India. India was ranked fifth most vulnerable nation globally in the South Asian ranking during COP (Conference of Parties) 25.
India witnessed unprecedented heatwaves this year from March to April and many places recorded temperature above 45°C over extended time periods. Although the actual number of human fatalities were not fully certain, places like Maharashtra reported 374 heat stroke cases and around 25 deaths in the two months period. In addition, the heatwaves also enhanced the electricity crisis and around 66 per cent of the households in the nation faced power outages.
Agricultural sector was also heavily affected due to these extreme heatwaves. While India’s wheat production was projected to reach a record 111.32 MT in 2022, the recent data showed that the output reached at 105 MT. Farmers of Punjab, the key wheat growing area reported 50 per cent decline in wheat productivity. The shriveling of wheat grains occurred, resulting in the low output, because of the loss of moisture. Needless to say, that these unprecedented heatwaves could be a harbinger of many such things in future. India needs to be prepared to adapt to these and to other extreme weather events such as droughts, floods and cyclones.
Increased precipitation levels are triggering a surge in extreme flood events. This is thereby damaging infrastructure and disrupting the social and economic capital by creating excess loss and damage to lives, livelihoods and real estate. India witnessed around 250 extreme events in the period 1970-2005 and around 310 extreme and its associated events, post 2005. Recurrent floods and droughts lay a great challenge to food and water security. States like Maharashtra, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh went through severe water scarcity in the year 2015 due to extreme high summer temperature and weakening monsoons.
A study conducted by Indian Meteorological Department (IMD 2015) showed that some drought prone Indian districts are becoming flood prone and vice-versa. Places like Rajkot, Surendranagar, Ajmer, Jodhpur and Aurangabad have shifted from floods to droughts, whereas regions in states like Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha and Tamil Nadu have shown shifting trends from droughts to floods. However, these places could be put under simultaneous occurrence of floods and droughts. Globally, extreme weather events have caused losses of hundreds of billions of dollars.
In a report published by World Meteorological Organization (WMO), more than 11,000 disasters have occurred between 1970 and 2019, which have accounted for over 2 million deaths and USD 3.64 trillion in losses. Owing to India’s vulnerability to extreme weather events, it is not surprising that the nation has been categorized as one of the world’s most affected regions by its impacts. The latest edition of Global Climate Risk Index, published by Germany based development and environmental NGO reported that India was the seventh most affected country considering the impacts of extreme weather events in 2019.
In 2019, higher than normal rainfall occurred in India from the month of June to September. The floods caused nearly 1,800 deaths across 14 states and around 1.8 million were displaced. Furthermore, there were eight tropical cyclones that struck the coastal areas of India. Out of these eight, six were categorized under “very severe” list. Cyclone Fani was considered to be the biggest and the most destructive amongst them. Approximately 28 million people collectively in India and Bangladesh were affected, and it caused an economic loss of USD 8.1 billion.
India is already showing notable progress in adapting to a number of extreme weather events. For an instance, 23 Indian states have implemented heat action plans that include taking prior actions for preparing the people and public services. To tackle the impacts of floods and cyclones, cities alike Assam have built retaining walls along rivers and coasts, expanded their drainage systems, installed water pumps along parts of rivers and their tributaries and have set up measures at different levels to issue timely alerts. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) defined Nature based Solutions as “actions to protect, sustainably manage, and restore natural or modified ecosystems, that address societal challenges effectively and adaptively, simultaneously providing human well-being and biodiversity benefits.” These solutions can be creating green roofs and walls, increasing green space by planting trees in and around urban areas to lessen the impacts of heatwaves.
Global, regional, national and sub-national climate actions are geared towards limiting any further increase in the earth’s temperature to 2°C. However, the consequences of these “target” temperature increase should also be considered. It’s already a known fact that the current trends in the extreme events are the outcomes of a 0.6°C rise in the past century. Although, adaptations may take more forms, nature based solutions could be amongst the most cost-effective measures in dealing with the consequences of extreme events and climate change.
Aakansha holds a master's degree in biotechnology and is currently working as a research scholar. An avid reader, Aakansha finds keen interest in reading and writing on areas related to clean energy and zero carbon emissions.
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