2022 Pakistan Floods

• Floods affected at least 33 million people and killed at least 1,739 from the beginning of monsoon season in mid-June 2022 to Nov. 18, 2022.
• 20.6 million people required humanitarian assistance.
• According to the post-disaster needs assessment, the flooding caused $14.9 billion in damages and $15.2 billion in economic losses. Estimated needs for rehabilitation and reconstruction in a resilient way are at least $16.3 billion.
• The UN’s development agency, UNDP, said an additional nine million people were at-risk of being pushed into poverty on top of the 33 million affected by the devastating floods.
• Almost 10.5 million people in Pakistan experienced high levels of acute food insecurity between April to October 2023.
• More than 1.2 million livestock were killed during the 2022 monsoons, with severe repercussions on the livelihoods of affected households and the supply of animal products, including milk and meat.
• According to officials, the floods affected nearly 15% of Pakistan’s rice crop and 40% of its cotton crop.
• The floods displaced at least 7.9 million people. In 2023, many displaced people returned to their places of origin, but they returned to challenging circumstances.
• More than 2.1 million homes were damaged or destroyed by the floods in 2022.
• As of March 31, 2023, humanitarian partners had provided assistance to an estimated 7.51 million people.
• As of Aug. 25, 2022, Pakistan received nearly 15 inches (375 millimeters) of rainfall, almost three times higher than the national 30-year average of 5 inches (130 millimeters). Balochistan province received five times its average 30-year rainfall.

According to the Pakistan Education Sector Working Group, the floods affected 2.2 million children and damaged a total of 34,204 schools in 126 districts.

Pakistan has a long history of major disasters disrupting education for children. Work to cleanup and restore educational facilities damaged by the flooding will take time and temporary learning centers have been used to continue children’s education as recovery continues.

IOM conducted a Community Needs Identification (CNI) in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces between January and March 2023. The CNI found that distance, cost of education and lack of learning supplies as the main issues to access education services for displaced children.

Nearly one year on from the floods, school reconstruction was insufficient. Considering the scale of damaged and destroyed schools, this is understandable, however, the implications for children’s education are severe.

According to the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), some 9.4 million acres of crop area in Pakistan were potentially inundated in August 2022, including 4.8 million acres in Sindh, 2.7 million acres in Punjab, 1.2 million acres in Balochistan and 714,000 acres in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. At least 1.2 million livestock were killed, with severe repercussions on the livelihoods of affected households and the supply of animal products, including milk and meat.

According to officials, the floods affected nearly 15% of Pakistan’s rice crop and 40% of its cotton crop. Floodwaters wiped out the personal grain stores that many farming families rely on for food yearlong.

Sindh province accounts for nearly one-quarter of the country’s agricultural output, so the damage to crops there and reduced harvests were expected to have implications for food security in Pakistan.

The post-disaster needs assessment released in October 2022, said poverty could potentially increase by 5.9 percentage points, meaning that an additional 1.9 million households are at risk of being pushed into poverty. In addition to impacts being felt by farmers and herders, Pakistan’s fishers are also struggled.

In early January 2023, UNDP said it estimated that an additional nine million people risk being pushed into poverty.

A critical concern in flood-affected areas was the nutrition crisis. A rapid survey by the UN’s Children’s Fund in 15 flood-affected districts released in May 2023 revealed that “one-third of children aged 6-23 months suffer from moderate acute malnutrition, and 14% suffer from severe acute malnutrition, a life threatening form of malnutrition.”

FAO and WFP said in their acute food security outlook for June-November 2023, “Acute food insecurity is likely to further deteriorate over the coming months, if the economic and political crisis further worsens, compounding the effects of the 2022 flooding.”

The rise in inflation had an impact on the ability of families to secure food. According to WFP’s market monitoring in March 2023, “Headline inflation based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI) is the highest in 49 years (since 1974), representing an increase of 31.55% in February 2023 compared to February 2022. It should be noted that inflation rates in neighbouring countries stand at 3.6% (Afghanistan), 6.4% (India), and 8.8% (Bangladesh).”

The WFP report also said food prices continued to increase since February 2022 for the 12th consecutive month. The inflation rate in Pakistan increased by 3.46%, reaching 28.3% in July 2023.

Worsening the humanitarian situation was the significant damage to roads, bridges and telecommunications across the country. The floods damaged more than 8,000 miles (13,000 kilometers) of roads and 410 bridges, hampering people’s ability to seek safety and reach markets. Sindh province was the most affected, with 64% of the total road damage and 40% of the bridge damage nationwide. The floods also caused “unprecedented damage” to Pakistan’s rail network.

Internet outages were reported, with the Pakistan Telecommunications Authority attributing the cuts to faults in the fiberoptic network resulting from the floods. Flash floods and landslides were compounded by the inability of existing infrastructure to cope with the extraordinary amount of water.

Water infrastructure suffered significant damage, and the flood-affected health system was impaired in addressing and mitigating the risk of a major public health crisis. Damaged health infrastructure and inadequate water and sanitation compounded the risk of measles and rubella, along with water-borne, skin, and acute respiratory illnesses.

Prior to the floods, the country’s drinking water supply system covered 92% of the population. However, only 36% of the water was considered safe for consumption. The floods damaged most of the water systems in affected areas, leaving more than 5.4 million people to rely on contaminated water from ponds and wells.

The floods caused total or partial damage to 2.1 million homes, a staggering statistic.

An example of the results of the enormous needs combined with very limited resources was that the Shelter Sector was forced to reduce shelter assistance to include just one tarpaulin per household, halving the normal international standards for humanitarian response.

IOM conducted a CNI in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces between January and March 2023. The CNI found that 60% of temporarily displaced households were living in temporary structures (i.e. tents or emergency shelters).

Health officials warned of large-scale disease outbreaks following the flooding. They were very concerned about the potential spread of waterborne diseases, which will further strained health facilities.

According to UNICEF in March 2023, “more than 10 million people, including children, living in flood-affected areas remain deprived of safe drinking water, leaving families with no alternative but to drink and use potentially disease-ridden water.”

According to the revised Pakistan 2022 Floods Response Plan, “Damage to drinking supply systems and more than 1,460 public health facilities and their contents have reduced access to safe and clean water and inhibited the provision of health services at a time of increased need. Women are disproportionately affected, as they typically bear the burden of tasks such as collecting water for daily household needs and caring for the sick.”

Pakistan had been making steady progress against malaria. However, the floods hit districts that had the most difficult malaria situation already.

In early February 2023, malaria and cholera were significant public health concerns. In their Feb. 6, 2023 Situation Report, UNOCHA said high malaria positivity rates had been reported at least in 12 flood-affected districts of Sindh and Balochistan. Also, “sporadic cases of cholera are being reported with the potential to spread given the poor access to safe water and sanitation.”

The floods had a significant impact on health, particularly for children.

As is often the case in disasters, the floods exacerbated underlying vulnerabilities that existed prior to the flooding. Click To Tweet

According to WHO, “Pakistan is among the top 10 countries in the world with a large pool of unvaccinated or undervaccinated children and is home to more than 600,000 children who have not received a single vaccine dose. The recent floods have compounded the problem, further reducing access to routine immunization services, especially in flood-affected districts.”

IOM conducted a CNI in Balochistan and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa provinces between January and March 2023. The CNI found that suspected/confirmed malaria (39%) and respiratory infection (20%) were reported as the primary health concerns in the assessed villages.

Also worrying was that, at the height of the floods, almost 650,000 women in flood-affected areas needed maternity services, but damage to health facilities, limited medical supplies and challenges reaching functioning facilities prevented some women from getting the care they needed. Experts feared an increase in infant mortality or health complications for mothers or children in a country that already has one of the highest maternal mortality rates in Asia.

According to UNOCHA in early February 2023, “The 5.71 million women and girls in flood-affected areas continue to be at a high risk of gender-based violence (GBV), compounding pre-existing gender inequality and vulnerabilities, lack of availability and access to lifesaving GBV services. With limited and/or no access to services, women and girls are at heightened risk of resorting to negative coping mechanisms.”

The government was concerned about the spread of the wild poliovirus as millions of people were displaced due to the flooding. On Sept. 28, 2022, partners of the Global Polio Eradication Initiative and donors met in Islamabad to assess needs and discuss a path forward. A three-day-long campaign was held from Jan. 16-18, 2023 with the aim to immunize more than 44.2 million children under the age of five against the poliovirus. On March 17, 2023, the Pakistan National Polio Laboratory confirmed a three-year-old child was paralyzed by polio.