Digital Nation Pakistan Act 2025: An Enabler for Climate Action and Resilience

Noor Fatima, TAF Associate, talks about Pakistan’s Climate Challenge and the Path Forward: The Role of NDCs and Digital Governance

Climate change is no longer a distant threat for Pakistan; it is a present and escalating crisis. The country has witnessed severe climate-induced disasters in recent years, deeply impacting millions of lives, infrastructure, and development goals. Amid these challenges, Pakistan’s commitment to climate action through its updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) and innovative legislative moves like the Digital Nation Pakistan Act 2025 represent crucial steps toward climate resilience and sustainability. This blog explores Pakistan’s current climate situation, reviews progress on its climate commitments, assesses institutional roles, and realistically analyzes how digital governance can amplify these efforts, along with what additional measures are necessary.

Escalating Climate Crisis in Pakistan: Recent Disasters and Their Effects

Pakistan is among the most climate-vulnerable countries globally. In recent years, especially since 2021, the harsh reality of this vulnerability has been unveiled through drastic climate events. The summer monsoons of 2022 unleashed Pakistan’s worst-ever floods in recorded history. Torrential rains between June and August led to riverine, urban, and flash flooding that affected approximately 33 million people, roughly one in every seven Pakistanis, and displaced nearly 8 million. The floods caused over 1,700 fatalities, with children constituting about one-third of the casualties, and inflicted an estimated $15 billion in economic damages and losses, a staggering blow to the country’s financial and social fabric.

The next years, including 2025, continued to see intense rainfall and damaging floods across key provinces like Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, where infrastructure and homes suffered severe damage. The recent tragedies in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Swat, and Buner, where flash floods and landslides have continued to claim lives, sweeping away entire villages. Compounding this, Pakistan’s northern mountainous regions experienced extreme temperatures exceeding 48°C, accelerating glacial melt, which worsens flood risks downstream. Climate change has driven these trends: attribution studies estimate that human-induced warming has increased the intensity of monsoon rains by 10-15%, making floods more frequent and destructive.

Besides floods, Pakistan grapples with heatwaves, droughts, landslides, and desertification, straining water resources and agriculture. Vulnerable populations, dependent on fragile ecosystems for their livelihoods, face outsized risks amid limited adaptive capacity.

The German watch Climate Risk Index consistently ranks Pakistan as one of the top countries severely affected by extreme weather, even though Pakistan is responsible for only half a percent of global greenhouse emissions.

Pakistan’s Climate Commitment: The Updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) 2021

Pakistan’s Climate Commitment: The Updated Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) 2021

In response to this crisis, Pakistan submitted its updated NDC in 2021 under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), reaffirming an ambitious climate agenda aligned with the Paris Agreement’s objective of limiting global heating.

The NDC focuses on several mitigation pillars:

1. Target to reduce Pakistan’s projected greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030.

2. Transition to renewable energy aiming for 60% of the energy mix by 2030.

3. Phasing out imported coal and restricting domestic coal use.

4. Promoting electric vehicles, targeting 30% of new sales to be electric by 2030.

5. Scaling up nature-based solutions, particularly through the Ten Billion Tree Tsunami Program (TBTTP) to restore forests and improve carbon sequestration.

6. Enhancing energy efficiency, cleaner industrial production, and sustainable agricultural practices.

Adaptation measures emphasize strengthening resilience to floods, droughts, and extreme weather, improving early warning systems, water and disaster management, protecting vulnerable communities, and integrating climate risks into development planning. : Pakistan’s updated NDC (2021) estimates a total of $101 billion for transitioning to 60% renewable energy (including hydropower) and 30% electric vehicles by 2030, with 35% of this ($35 billion) contingent on international grant finance.

Progress, Institutional Roles, and Challenges

Pakistan has made incremental progress, such as expanding renewable energy capacity and forest conservation efforts, contributing to an 8.7% emissions reduction between 2016 and 2018, partially from forestry gains. However, recent disasters have exposed significant gaps in adaptation capacity and infrastructure resilience. It is argued that the crisis has been worsened by longstanding governance failures and poor policy decisions.

Institutions like the Ministry of Climate Change are central to driving climate policies, international negotiations, and mobilizing climate finance. They oversee the implementation of the NDC, national adaptation plans, and coordinate with development partners. Meanwhile, agencies like the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) have taken frontline roles in flood response, early warning dissemination, and disaster relief.

Despite these efforts, institutional capacity constraints, financial shortfalls, and limited disaster preparedness hamper progress. Challenges include insufficient infrastructure to handle extreme floods, delayed warnings, and gaps in integrating climate data for risk management. In several recent incidents, civilian casualties in Punjab and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa were traced to the illegal construction of homes near riverbeds and flash floods sweeping away poorly built houses.

The repeated devastating floods show that current resilience measures are inadequate, and there is a pressing need to strengthen policy reforms, community preparedness, and governance systems. Bureaucratic delays is one of the major reasons for institutional failure because even in today’s fast-paced digital era, we still heavily rely on paper approvals which takes up the energy that should be dedicated to the cause and implementation of the policy. To develop climate resilience, we must build a strong foundation by overcoming resistance to change and adapting to new tools for effective governance. That’s where the Digital Nation Pakistan Act comes into play.

The repeated devastating floods show that current resilience measures are inadequate, and there is a pressing need to strengthen policy reforms, community preparedness, and governance systems. Bureaucratic delays is one of the major reasons for institutional failure because even in today’s fast-paced digital era, we still heavily rely on paper approvals which takes up the energy that should be dedicated to the cause and implementation of the policy. To develop climate resilience, we must build a strong foundation by overcoming resistance to change and adapting to new tools for effective governance. That’s where the Digital Nation Pakistan Act comes into play.

Digital Nation Pakistan Act 2025: An Enabler for Climate Action and Resilience

The recently enacted Digital Nation Pakistan Act 2025 may not explicitly target climate change, but its potential to accelerate climate resilience and mitigation is substantial when viewed as a governance and technology enabler.

The Act establishes a comprehensive digital infrastructure framework, including the Pakistan Digital Authority and National Digital Commission, to implement a National Digital Masterplan. This includes interoperable digital public infrastructure such as national digital identity systems, data exchange platforms, and digital services covering sectors like agriculture, health, energy, and finance.

How does this translate to climate action?

1. Improved data integration and real-time monitoring: Digital governance can enhance the Monitoring, Reporting, and Verification (MRV) systems for emissions and adaptation efforts, ensuring transparent, timely, and accurate climate data across all levels of government.

2. Smarter early warning and disaster management: Digital tools can support robust early warning systems for floods and other climate events, enabling faster and more precise evacuation and relief actions.

3. Efficient climate finance management: Transparent tracking of climate funds, grants, and investments at the national and provincial levels helps optimize resource use and accountability.

4. Service delivery to vulnerable populations: Digital identity and targeted data can enable the effective delivery of social protection and adaptation finance to climate-affected and marginalized communities.

5. Sectoral efficiency gains: The digital masterplan supports sectors critical for emissions reduction, such as smart grids in energy, digital supply chains, and climate-smart agriculture advisories.

The Digital Nation Act acts as a powerful accelerator for Pakistan’s climate commitments, improving governance, coordination, transparency, and inclusivity, which are all essential for translating policy ambitions into on-ground results.

However, it is not sufficient on its own. The Act must be integrated with specific climate policies, adaptation infrastructure investments, institutional capacity building, and widespread public engagement. Data privacy, digital equity, and infrastructural reach remain challenges to be carefully managed.

What Else Needs to be Done?

To comprehensively combat Pakistan’s escalating climate crises and meet the 2030 NDC targets, the following steps are critical:

1. Massive Climate Finance Mobilization: Pakistan’s needs exceed $100 billion; scaling international cooperation, green bonds, and climate funds is urgent.

2. Infrastructure Resilience Upgrades: Flood defenses, urban drainage, resilient housing, and water management systems must be upgraded to cope with increasingly severe weather.

3. Strengthening Institutional Capacity: Ministries, disaster authorities, and local governments need enhanced skills, coordination protocols, and data capabilities.

4. Community-Level Preparedness: Early warning communication systems need expansion with strong community engagement and education programs.

5. Inclusive Climate Governance: Policies must address gender, youth, and vulnerable groups explicitly to ensure equitable climate resilience.

6. Sector-Specific Emission Reductions: Expansion of clean energy, electric transport, sustainable agriculture, and forestry programs must be accelerated.

7. Policy Integration: Synergize digital governance tools with climate strategies, environmental laws, and national development plans.

8. Research and Innovation: Support knowledge generation, climate science, and innovation in green technologies adapted to Pakistan’s context.

Conclusion

Pakistan stands at a critical crossroads. It is a nation bearing some of the heaviest burdens of global climate change despite minimal historical emissions. Its 2021 updated NDC articulates a bold roadmap for halving emissions by 2030 and building climate resilience. Yet, the worsening climate disasters reveal that ambition alone is insufficient. Coordinated institutional action, strengthened infrastructure, and innovative governance are imperative to avoid escalating human and economic costs.

The Digital Nation Pakistan Act 2025 provides a promising technological and governance foundation that, if effectively integrated with climate policies, can enhance transparency, data-driven decision-making, and inclusive service delivery, key enablers for achieving Pakistan’s climate goals.

Pakistan’s climate future depends on harnessing this digital transformation alongside sustained financial, institutional, and strategic investments. Only then can the country hope to navigate the mounting climate risks, safeguard its people, and progress on a sustainable development trajectory aligned with international climate commitments.