Pakistan’s heightened exposure to climate-related hazards, coupled with its insufficient coping mechanisms, underscores the nation’s ongoing vulnerability to climate disasters. As urban areas face the brunt of these impacts, the need to integrate climate resilience into development planning has become a critical necessity.

However, the urban housing sector, already struggling to keep pace with rapid population growth, is exacerbating the situation. With a significant portion of the urban population living in informal settlements under dire conditions, the challenge of providing affordable, resilient housing is more urgent than ever.

Amid the looming threat of flooding in key urban centers due to heavy rainfall, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has pointed out that Pakistan’s urbanization issues are intensifying, largely due to ineffective governance and the failure of multiple service delivery systems. In its report titled “Pakistan National Urban Assessment,” the ADB highlights how numerous, often conflicting governance structures obstruct the clear assignment of responsibility for municipal service failures. The accountability of various municipal service providers operating within urban areas is not consistently aligned with the corresponding local government.

These providers include local development authorities tasked with land use planning and management, water and sanitation agencies responsible for the provision of water and sewage services, traffic engineering and planning agencies focused on developing transport infrastructure, cantonment boards which oversee municipal services in military-owned areas, and industrial estates and private housing societies which manage local housing developments. Without agreements that delegate authority from local governments to these service providers, elected urban governments are unable to effectively coordinate these entities to maintain a minimum standard of municipal services for all residents.

The report also notes that military lands and cantonments fall outside the jurisdiction of city administrations and are governed by the Military Lands & Cantonments Group, a department under the Ministry of Defence. This group administers 44 cantonments through local cantonment boards and manages Ministry of Defence land across the country through 11 military estate circles. Unlike municipal areas, cantonments strictly enforce bylaws and regulations, with minimal encroachment on privately-owned lands under their development.

The increased imperviousness of urban surfaces, driven by the loss of green spaces and soil sealing from extensive construction and infrastructure development, is a significant contributor to urban flooding. Lahore serves as a prime example, becoming more susceptible to flooding after losing more green cover in seven years (2010–2017) than in the previous two decades combined. Urban flooding is further worsened by aging and overwhelmed drainage systems, inadequate rainwater storage and management systems, poor waste disposal infrastructure, institutional capacity challenges, weak urban governance, and development practices that disregard the natural topography and landscape.

Moreover, air pollution alone reduces the average Pakistani’s life expectancy by 4.3 years and causes an annual GDP loss of 6.5% due to mortality and disability.

Pakistan’s high vulnerability to climate-related hazards such as floods, droughts, and cyclones, combined with its limited capacity to cope, means that the country will remain persistently at risk of climate-induced disasters. As a result, integrating climate mitigation and adaptation strategies into development planning is not just a choice but a critical necessity. Urban areas, in particular, are especially susceptible and are likely to experience the most severe impacts of climate change. Therefore, urban planners and agencies must urgently adopt climate resiliency principles and strategies in their development efforts.

Urban housing development has struggled to keep up with the rapid pace of urban population growth. By 2018, the housing shortage had reached an estimated 10 million units, forcing about 57% of the urban population to live in slums or informal settlements, often under harsh and unsanitary conditions. While there is no recent data on Pakistan’s urban housing deficit, the World Bank reported a slight 1% decrease in the proportion of the urban population living in slums between 2018 and 2020.

Despite government promises to address the growing housing deficit, these commitments have not materialized due to the influence of vested interests. For example, government agencies controlling nearly 90% of public land in Karachi have been unwilling to allocate even a fraction of that land for affordable housing projects. The Naya Pakistan Housing Program, launched by the federal government in 2020, requires a monthly mortgage payment of Rs 20,000 as of December 2023, making it inaccessible to low-income groups. By mid-2023, the program had completed only 53,000 housing units, with another 28,000 under construction—falling far short of its goal to provide 5 million housing units to those without an independent residence in Pakistan.

As the urban population continues to grow, addressing the housing shortage will be increasingly challenging without the involvement of public-private partnerships (PPPs) that focus on the affordable segment of the housing market, including vertical housing developments. Although the PPP Unit of the Sindh government has initiated some interventions in the housing sector, these efforts have yet to yield significant results.

As the government’s role transitions from direct execution to enabling and facilitating private sector development for low-income housing, the establishment of a robust legal and regulatory framework to prevent market forces from prioritizing the interests of wealthier segments remains a critical challenge.

Pakistan’s urban housing crisis, intertwined with the looming threat of climate change, demands immediate and coordinated action. The gap between government promises and practical implementation highlights the need for a shift in strategy—one that involves both public-private partnerships and robust legal frameworks to ensure that affordable housing solutions are accessible to those who need them most. As the nation grapples with these dual challenges, building resilient, inclusive, and sustainable urban environments must become a central focus of development efforts. Only then can Pakistan hope to secure a stable and prosperous future for its urban population in the face of growing climate risks.