As global temperatures soar, seas roil, and more trees are razed for ‘development’ every passing year, the last couple of decades have seen the environment become an area of continuous concern for governments. Pakistan is no different.

The 1990s to 2000s have been tumultuous for Pakistan in this regard, with healthy forest cover decreasing from 20 percent in 1990 to only two percent in 2010, and about 7,700 hectares of agricultural land being continuously lost to urban sprawl in the 2000s. Initial social forestry programmes and other afforestation efforts made in response to this deterioration largely failed, leading to a rethinking of how afforestation would be carried out.

Under the Billion Tree Tsunami Afforestation Project (BTTAP) initiated in 2014, the PTI-led Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KP) government succeeded in restoring 350,000 hectares of forest in KP. According to the 2024 research article ‘Effectiveness of Billion Trees Tsunami Afforestation Projects in Restoration of Forests in Pakistan’, this success is largely attributed to a “policy shift from ‘reforestation’ to ‘holistic forest management’ incorporating forest surveillance, collective community efforts, and a ban on grazing and forest harvest.”

The project has subsequently been lauded, both nationally and internationally, for its impressive scale and implementation, enough to further initiate the country-wide Ten Billion Tree Tsunami Programme in 2018.

However, the global trend of such mass plantations (like the World Economic Forum’s ‘1t.org’ project and China’s ‘Great Green Wall’, amongst others) is not the environmental solution it is oft-claimed to be. The potential of newly created forests to capture carbon is frequently exaggerated — they can also harm biodiversity and are particularly damaging when used for ‘greenwashing’, ie to avoid cutting down on emissions, as explained by Thomas Crowther, former chief scientific adviser for the United Nation’s Trillion Trees Campaign.

The turn of the century has seen a series of initiatives pop up in Karachi in the hopes of making the city ‘greener’ — but what does this ground reality of ‘green’ really look like? Does this green phenomenon of Karachi — plantations, urban forests, park reform, etc — consist of meaningful, sustainable movement towards ecological preservation, or does it end at temporary beautification and green-washing?

BTTAP is not exempt from such criticism. It has been said to exacerbate existing social inequalities, and disregard local communities past initial plantation efforts. Moreover, challenges such as insufficient maintenance, cost-ineffectiveness, and the lack of enduring protective policy (allowing trees to be cut down five years after plantation) cast doubts about long-term sustainability and impact — not just of this specific project, but also of other green initiatives in Pakistan.

Karachi, for one, has seen a rush of urban greening projects initiated by both the government and civil society — parks, urban forests, green belts — struggling against an environment that grows more hostile year by year. But the city doesn’t seem to be improving in this regard — evident, for one, by the sharp increases in temperature (as shown in the graph above).

How much higher will the death count climb with every summer heatwave, and no shade or rain to offer respite? Tens of millions of rupees spent on failed date and palm trees — if reallocated correctly, could they have given breath to the most hostile, unliveable parts of Karachi? What long term impact, if any, do these very costly green initiatives actually have — and what does that say about our future?

BEAUTIFICATION AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT

There has certainly been no lack of urban greening projects popping up across the city. Their development over time, however — or lack thereof — illustrates that this trend often leans closer towards beautification instead of meaningful ecological impact.

As Yasir Darya, the founder of the Climate Action Centre (CAC), points out, the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) has almost 1,800 parks, around 650 of which are under encroachment, and many more of which are unusable due to mismanagement. However, he estimates that there are around 10,000 total spaces in Karachi, including these parks, which still hold potential to be purposed for multi-use green spaces. However, much of the actual conception of these spaces has been reduced to the trimming of grass, ornamental plants and the allotment of decorative features, particularly in state-run projects.

Such efforts for plantation seem to exist sporadically and in a vacuum. In the early 2000s, KMC introduced the mono-cultural planting of Conocarpus trees as a quick way to increase green cover and cut through the concretisation of the city. However, this turned out to be an ill-advised endeavour and was criticised on the basis of its release of allergens and its ill-suitedness for Karachi’s environment.

Tofiq Pasha, an environmental expert, explains how the Conocarpus’ verticality acted as a windbreaker, which “blocked the breeze, creating a vacuum and increasing the heat index.” Furthermore, he elaborates that, “Conocarpus consumes a significant amount of water from the soil” and “should be planted in regions which have waterlogging.”

Instead of alleviating the 2015 heatwave, the city’s several million Conocarpus consumed enormous amounts of resources, without resulting in much discernible impact.

Elsewhere, The Defence Horticultural Association has continued to plant (and replant) hundreds of coconut palm trees each year for several decades, in a futile attempt to make the region more green — date palms have also been planted, gifted from the Middle East, and lined all along Sea View as an exchange of goodwill. These palms face significant maintenance challenges and mostly cannot survive the high salinity of the sea — consequently, enormous sums of money have continued to be allocated, from public funds, towards this Sisyphean endeavour.

Similarly, several decades ago, eucalyptus trees were planted across Karachi in abundance. Later, it was found that their deep roots were sucking the underground water at a faster pace than native species would do, thereby, damaging road infrastructure, nearby buildings, and water and sewerage pipelines.

Thus, such seemingly random pockets of green planning then expose larger problems in the urban planning methodology. In a city already lacking in resources, efficient planning and, most pressingly, a rapid increase in temperature of over 1.6 degrees Celsius over 60 years, investing time, effort and resources on beautification is at best, wasteful and at worst, destructive.

INDIGENOUS PERSPECTIVES

Another common problem across the conception of these projects is their oversight of indigenous perspectives and regionality in plant selection. Native plants are more sustainable: they are well-adapted to the local climate, soil and ecosystem dynamics, and require less water, fertiliser and maintenance, compared to non-native species, and they greatly nourish local biodiversity and wildlife.

As the environmentalist Shahzad Qureshi explains, this biodiversity is crucial for the health of the ecosystem, and helps maintain overall ecological balance of the city. This is a formula that Qureshi has been particularly mindful of incorporating in his urban forest.

He explains that he founded the Neher-i-Khayyam forest based on Japanese botanist Akira Miyawaki’s methodology, developed in the 1950s, which involves a specific method of soil preparation and dense plantation of three to five native tree species per square metre, resulting in rapid forest growth, compared to conventional methods.

Certainly, the evidence suggests the same: the Neher-i-Khayyam urban forest features a large variety of plant species native to Karachi, such as Indian Tulip trees [paras peepal], Goondi [saucerberry], Arabic Gum [kikar/babool], and Mustard Tree [peelu], covered in a concentrated three acres of land.

The site features a sewage water filtration system, a vegetable garden providing year-round supply to the surrounding community, a small pond, and fruit trees. As a result, Qureshi notes the area has seen a “definitive drop in temperature”, as well as a flourish in local flora and fauna, like “birds such as Night Owls and other insects that had not been observed there for hundreds of years.”

Similarly, the Clifton Beach Urban Forest initiated by Masood Lohar features the same native kikar and peelu and acres of 600,000 mangroves across the beach. As a result, not only has this “created a barrier against tsunamis and cyclones”, Lohar explains, it has also “attracted around 105 different types of bird and butterfly species there and thus, overall, has created a marine ecosystem within the city.”

Instead of taking such case studies in consideration and expanding such initiatives as an extension, the Government of Sindh and the Defence Housing Authority (DHA) continues to break the momentum by invasive land development projects, such as coastal reclamation in Phase 8 extension (known as E8), rupturing the coastal ecosystem.

In 2022, I proposed a pro bono design to the Sindh High Court, under Justice Zulfiqar Khan’s bench, to declare the entire 21 kilometres of Karachi’s coastal edge a ‘Coastal Heritage Sanctuary Trail.’ It comprised of four zones — 1) Karachi Port Trail, 2) Sahil Trail Seaview, 3) Coastal Heritage Trail, and 4) Mangroves Sanctuary Trail — which would have protected Karachi’s coastal edge from commercialisation and ad hoc development. This would also create a natural buffer between urbanity and natural terrain, giving enough space for ecological preservation and regeneration.

Despite our legally contesting the commercialisation of DHA land along the sea, providing the preservation methodology and going through a long stay order in the high court, the future of coastal development is still pending and continues to face infrastructural ruptures.

The point we then arrive at remains clear: true sustainability requires incorporating indigenous knowledge and regionally appropriate plant species within Karachi’s urban greening initiatives and policies, which safeguards the ecosystem. Its frequent absence exposes the hollow and short-term nature of our green initiatives.

In actuality, over 50 percent of Karachi’s trees are exotic alien species. When green projects are designed without considering the local environment and community expertise, they become victims of greenwashing — offering little more than lip service to sustainability — and end up becoming a drain on time and resources.

Qureshi emphasises incorporating this ecological indigeneity: “Only by doing so can we create contextually appropriate urban greening efforts that align with both the ecological and cultural landscape of Karachi, creating sustainable change.”

A FLAWED APPROACH

Still, that is not to say that the aforementioned are perfect examples of meaningful green initiatives. They, too, are not without their criticisms: the suitability of the Miyawaki Method as well as the long term sustainability of urban forests within the context of Karachi has been brought into question by several environmental experts.

Pasha, for instance, argues that the scale of impact for an urban forest is largely limited, due to the scope of its space. “The whole concept of the urban forest is that it is a narrow, small space,” he explains, and “if using public resources, then I think it’s better to line 10 miles of roadside with trees rather than plant an acre of urban forest,” as that would vastly increase the scale of impact.

Environmentalist Rafiq Haque raises similar concerns about the cost-effectiveness of large-scale urban forest projects, especially in light of the Mayor of Karachi Murtaza Wahab’s plan to implement 300 urban forests across the city.

Pasha concludes, “It is a very expensive proposition, especially due to its method of soil preparation, and [because it utilises] public funds. Given the size of our population and our economic condition, we cannot afford that.” Across the border, urban forest initiatives in cities that are also coastal and similar to Karachi, such as Chennai, have not yielded scientifically useful evidence regarding large-scale impact.

This then leads us to the question: who benefits from these initiatives?

Much like all other public areas, green spaces in Pakistani cities are also often concentrated in privileged areas, creating significant disparity in access. As Yasir Darya of CAC points out, “There is no equitable distribution of green spaces across the city, leading to significant environmental injustice.” Take, for example, affluent neighbourhoods like Clifton in Karachi, which benefit from well-maintained parks and urban forests (both of Karachi’s urban forests are located here, interestingly), while less affluent areas, such as Neelam Colony, have sparse public spaces and urban greenery.

Darya expands on this phenomenon, explaining how when “large-scale development initiatives, both on the state and private level, take place in parts of the city such as Lyari and Malir, not only are the people in those communities not consulted, their homes are largely encroached upon and demolished to make way for new projects” by the government or unfettered mega-corporations.

In the instance of the Malir Expressway, Darya recounted how CAC had to help advocate for communities along the Malir River — the most vulnerable stakeholders, whose ways of living and precarity put them at incredible risk from the development of this road that was to cut through the river.

As a result, the same story repeats itself. Large demographics of the population are deprived of access to urban greenery and environmental justice — those same communities that are most vulnerable to its absence.

PUBLIC-PRIVATE COOPERATION

Finally, this largely comes down to a fragmentation between the public and private, both sectors contributing to the urban greening efforts, but often in uncoordinated and often diverging ways.

Private enterprises, though often more agile and better funded, tend to prioritise projects that enhance their own interests, such as the beautification of commercial areas or residential enclaves for the affluent. For instance, real estate development projects such as Bahria Town focus on large gated housing estates on the periphery of the city, which can have significant implications for Karachi’s social and physical environment. These developments often exacerbate spatial inequalities, creating enclaves of affluence, while neglecting the broader urban fabric.

In contrast, other critical issues arise from land reclamation efforts. For instance, the reclamation of mangroves and mudflats adjacent to low-income housing disrupts crucial coastal ecosystems, which serve as nurseries for local flora and fauna. Neighbourhoods such as Shireen Jinnah Colony, Sultanabad, Haji Camp, Ibrahim Hyderi, Khiprianwala Island and Bundal Island need extra environmental surveillance and protection from land reclamation and bizarre development ideologies.

At the same time, large-scale corporations engage in green-washing, while promoting their environmental initiatives, often focusing on superficial measures rather than making meaningful changes.

For instance, in 2018, a multinational company (MNC) globally announced ambitions for its packaging to be 100 percent recyclable or reusable by 2025. However, environmental critics pointed out that the MNC’s statement lacked clear targets, timelines, and comprehensive efforts to support consumer recycling. Greenpeace criticised the company for its incremental approach, suggesting it would not significantly address the issue of single-use plastics.

This scepticism was reinforced when the MNC, along with two beverage giants, was named one of the world’s top plastic polluters for the third consecutive year, in Break Free From Plastic’s 2020 annual report. Clearly, such environmental issues are compounded by neoliberal and capitalist frameworks that prioritise short-term profits over long-term sustainability.

On the other hand, public initiatives, while ambitious, frequently suffer from bureaucratic inefficiencies, lack of consistent funding, and a failure to engage local communities meaningfully. Specifically, adding to Karachi’s woes is the absence of a comprehensive master plan.

The last master plan, prepared in 2005 during the tenure of former mayor Mustafa Kamal with a vision extending to 2020, faced rejection from the Sindh government. Since then, there has been no development of a master plan for Karachi. The current government has expressed intentions to formulate a master plan extending to 2050. There is a dire lack of coordination between different government departments and private institutions to carry out the plantation work in the city effectively.

The result of such fragmentation is apparent even in projects such as the Green Line Bus Service, where 9,000 trees became the casualty in the development of one of the five routes charted out over 15 years ago under the Karachi Breeze project.

Moreover, according to the government’s own records, in 2001, under one of the first developed Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) systems, well over 7,000 trees were cut. Furthermore, it was estimated in 2022 that the total number of trees located on the route of the development of the Red Line BRT Project were 7,782, the majority of which were Conocarpus. At this point, 1,564 of these trees have already been removed between Tank Chowk and Check Post No. 6 in Malir Cantt, while 3,802 trees located between Tank Chowk and Safoora will be cut down.

A study by the Karachi Urban Lab suggests that, by 2021, the city’s intermediate green cover had declined by 40 percent over a span of 22 years. In its assessment, the horticulturists outsourced to salvage the environmental impact said they would transplant 800 trees only, because the rest of the chopped trees were Conocarpus, harmful to the Karachi environment. In the later phase, they only attempted to replant 12 trees, and since the timing and atmosphere were not taken into account while doing this exercise, only four of them survived.

This is not to say that planting trees is the only solution to our green crisis. However, for a country that has about five trees per capita when the global average is 422 trees per person — this is certainly a crucial concern.

FACING A DEAD END?

The framework of this article starts from the idea of our environmental action or ‘green phenomena’ leading, ultimately, to a dead-end. Why ‘dead end’, though? Why use a term with such finality?

As of now, public efforts to save our environment are going nowhere. There is a fundamental inertia within the ideology, prioritisation and implementation of ‘greenness’. For meaningful change to be enacted, the government must first understand that saving the environment means saving the land. And that it is vital to prioritise people and their lived experience within the vision towards a greener, liveable future — just as much as trees, clean air and water, preserving wildlife and biodiversity, disaster and climate management, and so on and so forth.

We’ve got the policies, we’ve got the agencies, we’ve got the frameworks for change, but, as Darya says, there is “zero implementation.” It is the government’s responsibility to actually implement existing laws, and supplement green change with new initiatives and approaches. It must take the lead on environmental action, and the subsequent stimulus for engagement within civil society must operate in a top-down direction; wherein grassroots training programmes, sustainability workshops and other public operations provide impetus for change.

The government understands ‘growth’ as development. Development is often used as a monolithic term, but it is important to note how neoliberal development, in particular, fails to incorporate human and non-human existence within its ideology of ‘growth’. Expansion takes place without a care for harm to human life, or the exploitation and destruction of nature, the killing of diverse fauna and flora, etc.

This negligence, in turn, has resounding effects on policy formulation and implementation. Its most dire consequences can be seen in the seasonal acceleration of guaranteed, incessant environmental disaster — winters yield choking smog, which makes way for heat spells and drought, which lead to torrential flooding and earthquakes where rising temperatures and soil erosion have laid waste to Pakistan’s topography.

There is little respite for the vulnerable, a demographic that increases day by day. And natural disasters are social disasters, exacerbated by inequitable emergency measures, poor infrastructure and planning, and disruptive developmental projects.

As this happens — particularly in areas such as Sindh, where rapid urbanisation of peri-urban areas has resulted in oversaturation by population explosion — thinking of infrastructure development as, primarily, housing and real estate concretisation, can only lead to a failure of such development mechanisms.

This happens because such mechanisms fail to prioritise the many holistic needs and requirements of the population. Development considers land only as a commodity, whereas agricultural land is the backbone of Sindh. To preserve it means creating and maintaining a buffer between agricultural lands and real estate zones.

In urban centres, applying non-porous methods that use high carbon materials, such as concrete pavers and unnecessary hard surface trails, generates more heat in large grounds. Non-porous methods are often used in parks and other green spaces because they are not critically thought of as technical lands, leading to a dearth of balanced infrastructure — mostly, the government fails to understand the meaning and utility of green spaces past mere beautification. However, it is essential to recognise the multiplicity of potential and benefit green spaces hold for our cities, and to incorporate porosity and accommodate people within this understanding.

Whether as parks, green belts, urban forests or rooftop gardens — for cooling of cities and insurance against disasters, for recreation and culture, heritage preservation, the growing of food, and so on and so forth — a more holistic greenness can give us more than we have conceptualised thus far.

This essay is dedicated to the recently chopped Banyan tree in Old Clifton, formerly located outside a newly built and contested police residential high rise. The tree was declared as heritage and of ecological importance in 2020. We believe that declaring and highlighting issues on paper is not the solution. Training and departmental collaboration is needed in order to take ownership of these natural terrains for a shared care eco-system.

Marvi Mazhar is the principal architect at Marvi Mazhar and Associates (MMA). X: @marvimazhar Research Assistants at MMA Zaynah Abbas, Midhat Zain and Hamza Allawala contributed to this piece The maps have been developed by MMA’s visual artist and researcher Samina Hassan

Published in Dawn, EOS, August 18th, 2024