PAKISTAN FLOOD: MAJOR THREAT TO COUNTRY’S FOOD SECURITY AS DEATH TOLL REACHES 1,265

Sat 03 September 2022:

The national disaster agency of Pakistan reported on Saturday that 57 more people had perished in the past 24 hours, bringing the total number of fatalities from the devastating floods in the country to 1,265.

The majority of the most recent fatalities, 38, have been recorded from the southern province of Sindh, where more land has been flooded in the central districts during the previous 48 hours due to a new round of flooding, bringing the total number of fatalities in the province to 502 since mid-June.

In separate flood-related incidents in the northwest province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, which has also been severely affected by swirling waters brought on by torrential rains, another 17 persons were killed.

Since June 14, a total of 285 people have died in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, followed by 257 fatalities in the southwestern Balochistan province, according to the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA).

Some 188 people have died in the northeastern Punjab province, the authority said.

Many people who are already marooned are now bracing for the peak of high flood at the Kotri barrage, located some 150 kilometers (about 93 miles) from Karachi on Saturday before the flow is released for the Indus Delta downstream.

Footage aired on local broadcaster Geo News showed hundreds of desperate people, including in the towns of Khairpur Nathan Shah, Johi, and Shadadkot in central Sindh, placing sand and sand-packed bags in an attempt to consolidate embankments against the gushing floodwaters.

Floods caused by unprecedented rains have inundated a third of the country, prompting the government to issue an international appeal.

Pakistan has already received 12 planes from Türkiye, one of which has just landed at Karachi airport, carrying tents, rations, medicine, kitchen items, baby food, and other relief supplies.

Türkiye, which sent a ministerial delegation to Islamabad on Friday to express its solidarity with Pakistan, also delivered two trains full of relief supplies to the flood-ravaged country. The country will send another train from Istanbul in the coming days.

Constant rains and raging floods have already destroyed a large chunk of the country’s infrastructure and agricultural lands, including tens of thousands of houses, roads, and bridges, as well as washing away over a million animals.

Almost 45% of the country’s cropland has already been inundated by the floods, posing a serious threat to food security and further adding to the already skyrocketing inflation.

SOURCE: INDEPENDENT PRESS AND NEWS AGENCIES

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