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Sukkur, Sindh Province, Pakistan -- On the way from the airport into the town of Sukkur you can see them camped along the road – thousands of people who fled the floods, now living in tents and makeshift shelters.  In some places, a group of families have found a spot of empty ground; in others, formal camps have been set up separated from the road by plastic sheeting.

The following morning, we met with the Regional Director of the Provincial Disaster Management Authority who explained the government’s latest crisis:  as it tries to move displaced families out of schools and public buildings, there is a shortage of over ten thousand tents.  The need is overwhelming.  Over 1.9 million houses have been damaged or destroyed across the country, and over a million of those are in Sindh alone.  

In some areas, people are returning home to rebuild their lives, but others are unable to go back as their homes remain under water.  Later that afternoon we visited a remote area about an hour south of Sukkur where a group of about 30 families, poor tenant farmers, had set up a makeshift camp on a piece of dry land.  They told us how they had fled with only the shirts on their backs and a few belongings when the floodwaters inundated their village.  They are living in the most primitive of shelters, but cannot go back because their homes are still under water.  One of the local NGOs had come to bring them towels and mats to keep dry and a few food provisions.  The lack of access to clean drinking water is also a problem.  With the crop ruined, and the likelihood of being able to plant seed for next season dwindling away, their future is precarious.  

The need across the country is tremendous.  The humanitarian community is doing all it can in the face of the enormity of the crisis. Two months since the flash floods began up north, aid groups are still rushing further and further south to keep pace with the devastation the flood waters have left in their wake.  And the desperation here will not end soon.

Twenty million people were affected by the flood. Most were poor to begin with, and were subsistence farmers.  Their livelihoods were washed away with the water.  The demand for humanitarian relief – food, water, sanitation, shelter – will likely continue well into next year.  And the losses here will reverberate across Pakistan.  This is the country’s breadbasket and its destruction puts further at risk the millions of Pakistanis who were already food insecure when the floods began.  Many fear a second disaster in the form of a food crisis.  To neglect or underestimate what will be required to help millions of poor, flood-affected Pakistanis back on their feet is not only a moral imperative but critical to the long-term economic development and security of the country as well.


Climate displacement program manager Alice Thomas, congressional advocate Renata Rendon and media relations manager Gabrielle Menezes are currently in Pakistan assesssing the humanitarian response to the floods.