Millions of Afghans had fled to Pakistan over the years as refugees – some from since the Taliban takeover in 2021, many from decades before. They have built homes and lives in Pakistan, some homes built from mud with their own hands, and believed they would be welcomed to stay, live and continue working in the Muslim-majority country of Pakistan. This past October, according to the BBC, Afghan refugees have have been told it’s time to return to Afghanistan.

Pakistan is sending them back to the Taliban terror group, of which they are terrified, and is bulldozing mud homes that Afghan refugees have built over the years.

“I am very sad about leaving my house. I can’t express in words the pain I felt leaving it. Our house was made of mud, and we built it ourselves. I planted many trees there. My neighbours and friends were in tears [when I left] – It’s the cruel government that is making us leave,” says Abdullah, who has a family of 20 people all born in Pakistan, while speaking to the BBC.

Pakistan is conducting a nationwide return of Afghans and others who they say are in the country illegally. A decree was issued at the beginning of October this year that some 1.7 million Afghans must return to Afghanistan. Pakistan has seen an increase of terror attacks, of which they are linking to Afghans. But they are collectively punishing all Afghans for any Taliban involvement.

The United Nations and its aid agencies in Afghanistan posted a message on Tuesday that they urgently need funds to provide “post-arrival” assistance to hundreds of Afghan families returning from neighboring Pakistan daily to avoid arrest and deportation.

“More than 60% of arrivals are children,” a UN coordination agency said in a statement. “Their condition is desperate, with many having traveled for days, unclear of where to return to and stranded at the border.”

The Pakistani government, in early October, ordered the deportation of all foreigners without legal documents, including 1.7 million Afghans, warning those who remained in the country beyond November 1 would be arrested and expelled to their countries of origin.

The UN refugee agency UNHCR, migration agency IOM, together with children’s agency UNICEF, said they are “deeply concerned for the safety and well-being of children and families affected…and alarmed at the potential consequences of this plan’s implementation.”

Almost 30 million people require humanitarian assistance and 3.3 million are internally displaced inside Afghanistan amidst overlapping crises. According to the UN, since September 15, an estimated 160,000 Afghans have left Pakistan, with 86 percent of families reported fear of arrest as the most common reason for leaving.

According to the AP those that leave Pakistan come with nothing because all their property was seized at the border crossing from Pakistan. There is no food, housing, toilets on their return.

Arshad Malik, country director for Save the Children, said those returning are coming back without education documents, making it difficult for them to continue their learning, as well as lacking the local Afghan languages of Dari and Pashto because they studied Urdu and English in Pakistan.

He warned that child labor in Afghanistan as well as their involvement in smuggling are likely to increase due to poverty as most returning families were among the poorest migrants in Pakistan.

“Smuggling at Torkham by children was one of the concerns from the past, so the involvement of children in smuggling and illegal goods’ transfer will increase,” Malik said.

According to the UN, Afghans make up one of the largest refugee populations worldwide. There are 2.6 million registered Afghan refugees in the world, of whom 2.2 million are registered in Iran and Pakistan. Some are in the United States, and some are in Europe. According to Canada’s CBC news Canada has welcomed 30,000 Afghan refugees recently.

Another 3.5 million people are internally displaced, having fled their homes searching for refuge within the country. In light of the rapidly deteriorating security situation since the Taliban took over in 2021, the number of people fleeing will likely continue to rise. Meanwhile, the Taliban is visiting Iran looking to cooperate.

The Taliban returned to power in 2021 after capturing Kabul and overthrowing the government of the Islamic Republic of Afghanistan, ending the 2001–2021 war. In September 2021 the Taliban re-established the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan. The Taliban government remains internationally unrecognized.

Update Nov 13, VOA reports they can stay until December.

The post Pakistan forces Afghan refugees back to the Taliban appeared first on Green Prophet.

One of the largest provinces in Pakistan, Balochistan is located in the southwest corner of the country and bordered by Afghanistan and Iran; home to less than five percent of the country’s population, it is also one of the most dangerous regions.

Live Science talked to Shubab Khan, a geoscientist at the University of Houston, who has twice failed to source funding from the National Science Foundation (NSF) that would allow him to study the poorly understood Chaman Fault – a major geological fault that stretches 528 miles, roughly the distance between San Diego and San Francisco in the United States. 

“Its location is in an area that is very difficult to do any traditional field work,” Khan told Live Science’s Our Amazing Planet. “I tried twice to submit proposals to [the NSF] and I got excellent reviews, but the review panel said I was risking my life to work in that area.”

The National Academy of Sciences has reportedly decided to support Khan’s efforts to explore this fault zone, which sprouted a mud volcano “island” near the town of Gwadar shortly after the 7.8 earthquake struck, though the research, like current relief efforts, could be hampered by security issues.

“There is a lot of animosity against the military in this area and since the Pakistani Army is leading the rescue efforts, it will be very difficult for them to operate, without coming under further attacks,”  Siddiq Baloch, editor of Balochistan Express, told Christian Science Monitor.

The two rockets were aimed at a military helicopter carrying chairman of National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) Major Gen. Muhammad Saeed Aleem and other senior military officials, the paper reports. The group was assessing damage and mapping out a relief plan.

“For the first 24 hours no one could reach the [worst affected] areas. Even now most of the aid is stuck in Quetta [the capital city of the province], because security is a concern,” says Baloch.

“If the government had paid any attention to these areas from before and built health and medical facilities there, which are currently nonexistent, things would have not been so bad. Many of the critically injured continue to die since they are receiving no help,” he added.

Baloch believes that this catastrophe presents an ideal opportunity for the government to patch up their relationship with people in Balochistan, who consider their territory to be both neglected and occupied. He also fears the death toll could reach 1,000.

:: CS Monitor

Image via Al Jazeera

The post Security Hampers Pakistan Quake Efforts appeared first on Green Prophet.

Biogas, primarily a mixture of carbon dioxide, methane, and hydrogen, is produced by decomposing organic matter.  Add oxygen and create a high-efficiency fuel for heating or to convert into electricity. The compressible gas can also be used to power motor vehicles.

General Electric (GE) just announced sale of its Jenbacher J312 engine to a landfill gas-to-energy project operated by Averda International in Naameh, Lebanon, near Beirut. The pilot scale project will generate approximately 637 kW of power and can be expanded to take full advantage of this landfill, the largest controlled dumpsite in Lebanon. The project will become operational by year end.

“The potential benefit of the Naameh project is that it could encourage other landfill sites to use the gas (that is currently being flared) for conversion to electricity. The contribution of the project to the environment and the energy sector makes it a great value to the community,” said Nabil Habayeb, GE president and CEO for the Middle East, North Africa and Turkey (MENAT) region.

Pakistan’s project establishes an anaerobic digestion facility in Landhi Cattle Colony region that will convert a daily stream of 4,200 tons of animal waste and 700 tons of food waste into biogas which can generate up to 30 MW of power. The project will be delivered in two phases, each providing 15 MW of capacity.

Karachi Electric Supply Company, one of the project developers, said in a press release that this is the first time that renewable energy will be utilized on a commercial scale in Pakistan.

“This project is a prime example of how innovation can be used to tackle some of Pakistan’s most pressing development issues,” Mouayed Makhlouf, International Finance Corporations (IFC) Director for the Middle East and North Africa told Biomass Magazine.  In addition to providing seed capital, IFC is advising the company on plant development.

Solar springs to mind as the optimal energy producer in the sunny, arid Middle East. There is tremendous  untapped potential for generating biogas by exploiting waste generated by industry and agriculture, municipal solid wastes, and sewage.

Municipal solid waste is an optimal feedstock for anaerobic digestion because on average, over 50% of Middle Eastern municipal waste consists of biodegradable, organic material. Anaerobic digestion of organic waste is an environmentally positive method of recycling biodegradable materials while producing economical energy as a byproduct.

Diverting waste from traditional dumpsites and instead, routing it to plants and controlled landfills which can convert it into biogas (and biomass) transforms a liability into an asset. Biogas technology is well suited for further exploitation in this region as both a remedy for urbanization and a producer of clean energy.

Image of burning corn from Shutterstock

The post Tapping Middle East Biogas Potential in Lebanon and Pakistan appeared first on Green Prophet.

This isolation officially ended last Friday when the United Arab Emirates ambassador to Pakistan inaugurated a new 448 meter bridge gifted by President Sheikh Khalifa. Named after the UAE’s ultimate eco-hero, the Sheikh Zayed bin Sultan Al Nahyan bridge cost $10.5 million to build and features solar-powered way lighting.

Essa Abdullah Al Basha Al Nuaimi “handed over” the bridge to  Pakistan’s Chief of the Army Staff, Gen Ashfaq Parvez Kayani and other officials last week Friday, according to The National.

The new landmark reflects the “spirit of fraternity, solidarity, mutual respect and shared vision between the two brotherly leaderships and people,” Mr. Al Nuaimi said at the opening ceremony.

In addition to providing a vital link to towns and villages on either side of the Swat River, the new bridge is expected to service 4,000 vehicles a day and reach a total of 500, 000 people living in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province north-west of Pakistan.

Last August (and the year before that), the area was devastated by incessant flooding that wiped out the previous bridge. And whilst climate change almost guarantees that the flooding will eventually return, this stalwart structure gifted by the UAE has been designed to rise above the flood plain.

Solar-powered lighting illuminates both the road and the structure, and The National reports that a pedestrian walkway that runs parallel to the road was incorporated into the design.

While Qatar and Libya step in to help lift Egypt out of its pot of woes, and Bahrain gifted money to the formerly famine-stricken Somalia, the United Arab Emirates has invested a great deal of money and time in Pakistan, where it has embarked on a series of environmental and humanitarian development projects. 

This latest initiative was carried out under President Sheikh Khalifa’s directive, which might explain why a model of the historic UAE Al Jahli Fort, which was apparently his favorite childhood playground, was built at the onset of one entrance.

There is some hope that the bridge and mini fort could become a hot new tourist destination and generate much-needed revenue.

Images via The National

The post Solar Bridge in Pakistan Replaces One Swept Away by Floods appeared first on Green Prophet.

Update: 2020: Construction of the Jeddah Tower in Saudi Arabia, also known as the Kingdom Tower, has been plagued by political, economic and labour issues, with the proposed completion date of 2020 deemed unrealistic for many years now.

Boys, boys, boys, when will you learn that size doesn’t matter as much as performance? Next Azerbaijan broadcast plans to top that with their own mile-high cloud-puncher. Then Pakistan upstaged both with their own biggest building boast.

And performance brings us full circle back to Team Saudi who just commissioned the project delivery team for their kilometer-high Kingdom Tower. Even though 7 years later the project never managed to launch while the Saudi King is building Neom on the Red Sea. Is this engineering ingenuity, diversion, or architectural porn?

Actions speak louder than empty press releases. Obama may have scratched another trip to the moon, but, regrettably, the terrestrial race towards the heavens is on.

Green Prophet’s told you all about Saudi Arabia’s Kingdom Tower. First conceived years back, geological testing commenced in 2008 for the planned one-mile-high structure. That initial engineering resulted in a down-sizing of tower height, which still bests Dubai’s Burj Khalifa.

Now Kingdom Tower is off the theoretical and into production. Its staying power lies in its wider context of regional development and in the deep pockets of its owner, billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal. The Prince likes his things big.

The Tower is the centerpiece of an ambitious urban development project called Kingdom City, a phased construction on 2 square miles of undeveloped waterfront property near the Red Sea port city of Jeddah. Once the Tower’s erected, they’ll be multiple phases of expansion and major infrastructure works to support it all.

British-based EC Harris and Mace have hooked up to provide project, commercial and design management for the $1.2 billion development which will break ground later this year. (Construction, by Bin Laden Group, is planned to wrap up in six years.)

This team’s delivered over 100 skyscrapers including London’s Shard and Abu Dhabi’s The Landmark. Adrian Smith, the American architect behind the Burj Khalifa and New York City’s Trump Tower, is the designer.

Stack up those four skyscrapers and you could run a 5k race along their facades without ever treading on something sustainable. Despite their sky-high project price tags, they are devoid of innovative design elements that would reduce their gargantuan environmental impacts or enhance occupant safety.

Consider the waste generated, the power and water consumed, the resultant road congestion, and the devastating impact on local real estate. Consider the thousands of birds who die in collisions with the acres of tower skin (ornithologist Daniel Klem, Jr. estimates that collisions with skyscraper glass kills up to 1 billion birds a year in the United States alone). Are Jeddah emergency services equipped to handle fires a kilometer above ground? Think of the attraction for splashy acts of terror.

Then read through their project press releases. You’ll find nothing to address those previous questions, but spot a few ho-hum green features including proximity to mass transit, high performance thermal glass, and efficient plumbing fixtures. The same can be said about my little apartment which was built over 25 years ago.

Middle Eastern mega-projects tend to chase world records in terms of manly dimensions or bloated price tags. What would it take to incite project teams to hit new heights in green technologies? Buildings made from smart materials that don’t deplete already-stressed water resources, with on-site renewable energy-generation. International media would eat it up, and it would be a powerful project differentiator for all stakeholders to lay claim to, with bragging rights to the host nation.

Call me Miss Cranky, but these competitions to see whose is biggest are better suited for the locker room and not the world construction stage.

The post Saudi Erects World’s Tallest Tower appeared first on Green Prophet.

Animals and animal rights are not top on any agenda in the Middle East, but in 2012, a number of incidents brought the controversial live export trade to the forefront of environmental and animal treatment in the region. First with Egypt, then with Bahrain and as a result, Pakistan. The deaths of tens of thousands of cows being transported from both Brazil and Australia to the region have once again put the controversial live export industry in the spotlight. 2012 was not a good year for animals in the region. Read on.

Earlier this year, some 30,000 cows died on a ship destined for Egypt after the Egyptian government refused to allow the ship to dock at a Red Sea port. They were slaughtered as a “precaution,” the ministry said.

Animals Australia, the leading organization reporting on the controversial live export trade to the Middle East and Southeast Asia, said the incident was among the worst the industry had witnessed in years.

Animals Australia’s Campaign Director, Lyn White, said in a statement that the ship was anchored at sea after being refused port in a number of countries in the region, including Egypt, where the cattle were supposed to be offloaded.

It’s understood that ventilation problems on the converted livestock vessel, the MV Gracia Del Mar, had caused the deaths of more than half of the animals on board since the ship left South America for Egypt a few weeks ago.

The ship was anchored in the Red Sea for weeks and saw more animals perish as a result.

“This is nothing short of an animal welfare disaster. If remaining cattle are not offloaded more of these animals will suffer appalling deaths at sea. We are appealing to authorities in Egypt to offload the remaining cattle at al-Sohkna, as was originally intended.

“This disaster is just another example of the inherent risks of transporting animals by sea. It was only nine years ago that 5,000 Australian sheep perished on board the MV Cormo Express after country after country refused to allow it to berth.

“And this isn’t the first time that mechanical issues have caused mass deaths on live export ships. We only need to look to the breakdown of the Al Messilah in Adelaide last year. Had that vessel broken down on the open ocean it would have caused a similar welfare catastrophe — as thousands of animals would have died.

“Australia also exports cattle to Al Sohkna Livestock company in Egypt. Whilst we have an MoU with Egypt which should ensure the offloading of our animals, it has never been put to the test. The Egyptians thus far have flatly refused to allow the MV Gracia Del Mar to dock despite the mass suffering of the animals on board.

“If they continue to refuse to allow the surviving animals to be unloaded it would provide little confidence that the non-binding agreement with Australia would be honoured if a similar incident were to occur on an Australian livestock ship.

“It should not matter if these cattle aren’t Australian and if Brazil doesn’t have a similar piece of paper, they should not be abandoned to suffer and die at sea. We are appealing to Egyptian authorities to offload these cattle as a matter of urgency.”

Bahrain helped to bring another tragedy to the forefront of international animal-related media after they refused to allow a ship carrying some 20,000 sheep to dock on its shores, forcing the vessel to Pakistan. The sheep fared even worse upon arrival in Pakistan.

Pakistan tried to bury sheep alive

Four Corners revealed that the sheep had survived the Pakistani government’s attempts to bury the animals alive.

“His fleece matted with blood and dirt — a reminder of the brutal mass slaughter he had lived through the night before,” Animals Australia said in a press release on the horror.

Animal abuse as “entertainment” in Gaza:

<iframe src=”https://embed.theguardian.com/embed/video/world/video/2013/dec/12/cattle-abuse-gaza-video” width=”660″ height=”390″ frameborder=”0″ allowfullscreen=”allowfullscreen”></iframe>

“Perhaps more than any other live export disaster (and there have been many), the horrific sight of frightened animals being chased, beaten, stabbed, and then thrown mercilessly into trenches (many while still alive), shatters any belief that Australia can maintain control over the fate of live animals once exported from our shores,” added Animals Australia in a statement to its supporters.

The video expose is another shocking reminder of the horrific conditions animals are placed in as part of the live export industry, of which Australia is a leader.

But a positive for many animal rights activists is the decline in Australia’s live sheep exports over the past decade.

In 2010, three million sheep were exported compared with 6.3 million in 2001.

Australia’s government last year was to see a bill that would have banned live export to the world, but industry lobbyists fought back and forced the legislation off the table in a move that angered animal activists in the country and across the world, notably the Islamic world, which receives the lion’s share of live cattle and sheep from both Australia and Brazil.

READ related: animal abuse at meat slaughterhouse in Israel

The post Animal Abuse Horrific for Livestock Sent from West to Middle East Ports appeared first on Green Prophet.

Their micro hydro-electricity projects, 70 up and running to date, include manufacturing and installation, giving Pakistani families in undeveloped communities clean and reliable power.

So far they have helped supply 10 MW of clean greenhouse gas-free power in two years, working closely with the Clean Development Mechanism, a United Nations tool to help mitigate climate change.

The projects are in “far flung areas” says Rahim Diyar (pictured above left), the managing director of Hydrolink.

Rahim is only 23-years-old, and armed with an MBA has enlisted his engineering brother Fazli Rabbi to help realize the dream of creating sustainable power for Pakistan, from within the country. A third brother Fazli Khaliq is the CEO.

Transforming the lives of women

“Water to Watts” is our working concept, explains Diyar. “This means from water we start collecting data, and through that water we generate electricity which means watts generated for communities.”

Non-profits, local and international, are funding the communities, who call on Hydrolink to fulfil the technology demands.

Diyar sees it as an important social entrepreneurship link as he is also making a bridge between academia and economic development, “offering research projects to the students and applying these projects to industry,” he tells Green Prophet.

Seeing light for the first time in rural Pakistan

“Pakistanis as well as foreigners are welcome to invest in this sector. Pakistan is facing electricity hardships today as we all know,” he adds.

For those interested in getting involved, consider that 1 KW costs 115,000 PKR or $1,352 USD. One home runs on about 5 KW, meaning a $5,000 investment.

For more details on getting involved in Hydrolink’s green power projects, contact Diyar at Hydrolink: hydrogngreen@gmail.com

The post Watts to Water Brothers in Rural Pakistan appeared first on Green Prophet.

Iran, finding itself increasingly isolated due to US-backed sanctions, has been pressing energy-deficient Pakistan to connect with Iran’s natural gas “peace pipeline“. Natural gas is better than coal (which is killing miners) and dirty fuel that Pakistanis use in their households, but it is not the greenest. We laud a new announcement by the International Finance Corporation, part of the World Bank Group, which is investing $38.1 million in the company Zorlu Enerji Pakistan Limited, a Turkish energy firm to build what it is calling a landmark wind energy project in Pakistan, the Associated Press Pakistan reports.

The Zorlu Energy Companies Group today has a total installed capacity of 603 MW electricity and 192 tons/hour of steam produced by fourteen power plants – five natural gas, seven hydroelectric, one geothermal, and one fuel-oil –  located in different parts of Turkey. The new wind power plant it will build will be located in the Sindh Province, which is still a region risky for investments, due to armed guards attacks.

However, if security needs are met, and we hope they are, the 56.4MW wind project is a step in the right direction in harnessing the global community’s financing dollars for green development. Other investors include the Asian Development Bank, ECO Trade and Development Bank, and Habib Bank which are financing the project which will cost $159 million USD.

Wikipedia editors say that Pakistan plans to produce 2500 MW of wind energy by 2015 to stop crippling power shortages.

In other news the Recharge blog is reporting that the Norwegian company NBT plans to build a 250MW wind farm in Pakistan, possibly in the first stage of what prove to be a $1 billion USD renewable energy scheme in Pakistan. Bring on the wind in Pakistan!

When the Zorlu Energy wind farm will be built it will be only one of two commercially operating wind power projects in Pakistan, and according to the report the deal supports Turkish power entities and their interest entering Pakistan’s renewable energy market.

“IFC’s partnership with Zorlu Enerji, one of our key clients, enables us to extend additional support to the renewable energy sector in Pakistan. We hope this project will stimulate the interest of other investors in harnessing the country’s favorable wind resource,” said Gulrez Hoda, the IFC Director for Infrastructure and Natural Resources in Eastern Europe and the Middle East and North Africa in a press announcement.

The project will help to alleviate Pakistan’s power deficit by developing a local, renewable resource for creating power. It will also contribute to reducing the country’s reliance on imported fuel from countries like Iran for power generation.

::Associated Press Pakistan

Read more on green Pakistan:
Meet the Miss Pakistan of Renewable Energy
Iran Forges Ties With Pakistan for Energy Business

Image of Pakistani boy flying kit via  o_O

The post World Bank Supports Turkey-Built 56.4 MW Wind Project in Pakistan appeared first on Green Prophet.

As Iran becomes more marginalized with US-backed sanctions, Iran seeks to conduct business with more hospitable partners, like Pakistan. Every year floods devastate Pakistan, this year with a momentous 6 million displaced. Lack of regular power, according to Natasha Paracha (Miss Pakistan 2008), is a top 3 problem in Pakistan, along with food insecurity, and the diseases and troubles that flood waters carry with it. But as past US President Clinton seeks to repair US-Pakistan relations Pakistan could be doing itself a disservice by looking to Iran to furnish its energy needs via an Iran-Pak gas pipeline.

According to the Pakistan Daily Times, Mashallah Shakari, the Iranian Ambassador to Pakistan, has said the Pakistan-Iran gas pipeline could bring an bring industrial revolution to Pakistan.

Two weeks ago, he said so at the Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry, commenting that such a pipeline would create “a peaceful atmosphere in the region” and it would improve tourism and economy of both the nations. Iran has already laid down a part of the pipeline, and he implored Pakistani businessman to look to strengthening economic cooperation between Iran and Pakistan.

Pakistan’s Iranian Big Brother?

He said exchange of business delegations could pave the way for exploring areas of common interest. Iran would provide technical and all other kinds of assistance to Pakistan to overcome energy crisis.

He said Ummah should be united to overcome the challenges of world powers. There were centuries-old civilisation, historical and cultural relations between Pakistan and Iran, both countries should enhance further cooperation in trade, industry and other sectors.

He expressed hope industrial exchange program would help promote trade relations. He said Iran was willing to import rice, meat, fruits and many other items from Pakistan, adding, Iran and Punjab government were going to set up slaughterhouses in Lahore.

He also said that Iran would help Pakistan with solar energy, and hydro-electrical projects, and that the two could launch joint projects in coal and dairy.

Pakistan and Iran currently manage a bilateral trade at about $1 billion. Iran already sells oil and electricity to Pakistan, and Pakistan could earn transit revenue if the pipeline continues to China.

Here is a 2010 video on the pipeline project from Al Jazeera on the pipeline:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_abw6TJImQQ[/youtube]

Originally it was the proposed Iran–Pakistan–India gas pipeline, known also as the IPI pipeline or the Peace pipeline, which would ship natural gas from Iran via India, and then to Pakistan. Since June this year Iran has given up talks with India and is appealing directly to Pakistan to broker a deal.

India pulled out over security concerns, thinking it would be vulnerable to sabotage. The US also put political pressure on India not to participate.

With such “peaceful” pipelines blowing up after peace disintegrates in countries like Egypt and Israel, I think that Pakistan might be wiser to develop its own renewable energy projects and to let the unpredictable Iran fend for itself. Oh, and wait the Iran-Pak Peace Pipeline has already been sabotaged, according to UPI today.

::Pakistan Daily Times

The post Iran Forgets India and Keeps Pitching Peace Pipeline to Pakistan appeared first on Green Prophet.

Everyone knows that the first thing you ask any beauty queen is about that wish –– what she would do to make the world a better place if she ruled the planet.  In 2008, Natasha Paracha got that question moments before she became Miss Pakistan World. But instead of pursuing a glamorous tour promoting products, she chose to make her wish come true: today she is using education as a tool to accelerate clean technologies and sustainable development in Pakistan.

Natasha is from Islamabad, Pakistan and is residing in New York City and lives between both worlds helping Pakistan become more sustainable. She is doing this in a number of ways –– both locally and globally. Her insights can help investors and philanthropists access opportunities to ignite change.

In Pakistan she works with the Alternative Energy Development Board, the Ministry of the Environment, and with private businessmen focusing on climate change and renewable investments. In North America she’s the spokeswoman for Katerva, an ideas and technology accelerator.

Green Prophet speaks with Paracha on what investors and entrepreneurs can learn about the clean tech opportunities emerging from Pakistan, desperately in need of help.

A UN World Health Organization report just out says the city of Quetta ––  the fruit garden of Pakistan –– is the third dirtiest city in the world for air pollution. WHO says that rapid industrialization and poor quality fuels for transport and electricity generation are to blame.

The sad news is that there is a lot of work to be done. Power needs, water and food are the biggest issues that Pakistan faces today, says Paracha.

On a really local level her family has founded an organization called Vision of Development, which provides micro-financing loans to Pakistani villagers. Her parents now reside in Los Angeles and hold fundraisers in support of rural development for their villages in Pakistan.

Speaking from the Punjab region Paracha says that the most annoying problem is load shedding. In simple terms this means that the capital city of Pakistan, Islamabad, has nearly twelve hours of load shedding per day. “The pattern without exaggeration is that we experience a power outage every other hour. In other words there is electricity from 1 to 2pm and none from 2 to 3pm and so forth. In the 21^st century very few countries experience electricity crisis at extreme levels and unfortunately Pakistan is one of them.”

Epic flooding in Pakistan

If you’ve been watching the news, Pakistan has other severe problems as well. Annual flooding devastates and displaces millions every year. This year alone an epic 6 million people were displaced. Along with the flooding; field crops are lost, food is contaminated, and water-borne diseases like Dengue start flooding the streets.

Flooding causes an outbreak of pests which can be controlled without using pesticides. Image via dfid

In terms of needs Pakistan could use investment in dam technology, water purification systems,  and load management technology to stabilize some of Pakistan’s most basic resources.

Annual floods destroy all the crops of local farmers and make the land infertile for months with stagnant water. Furthermore, clean water and food distribution become near impossible due to communities severed by the flood waters.

These are problems that can also be addressed as opportunities to stakeholders in making Pakistan sustainable. Whether for personal interests, or financial ones, the Pakistani diaspora has an important role to play, she says, welcoming other industrialists, like her family does, to adopt, and invest in Pakistan through fundraisers in the UK, Canada and the United States.

Paracha started working in development at the United Nations in 2007 where she covered the renewable energy beat around the Middle East, Latin America, and South East Asia. After her stint as a reigning beauty queen, she quit the pageant circle to focus on renewable energies for Pakistan. That has been since 2009, and the industry is still very much at a nascent stage, she says.

Pakistan looks to import clean technologies

Historically, Pakistan started its renewable energy quest in the 1970s, with hydra-dams, and now it is looking into wind farms and solar energy. “My primary focus is finding cheap sources of alternative energies for rural regions of the country. These could be technologies that are being imported from Europe, the US, Canada and China,” Paracha says.

Doing business in Pakistan could mean investing in solar streetlights, solar-run farming technologies, wind farms, and waste to energy for bio-diesel –– all areas of interest that she oversees on the job.

It is still hard to provide concrete examples of what’s happening in Pakistan because the idea of clean energy implementation is still in the early stages:  “Renewable energy is up and coming and is attracting the leading Pakistani families [industrialists] in textiles, mills or farming. They all want to build power plants, explore opportunities in biomass and other forms of clean technology,” she says.

Solar lights help women cook at night after the flood, in Sindh, Pakistan. Image via dfid

Many Pakistani industrialists living abroad have an attractive network of social entrepreneurs willing to help the cause of sustainable development within Pakistan. “This could possibly be an effective means of advancing Pakistan’s clean tech sector. These initiatives can be taken on by local individuals and NGO’s striving for change for a better Pakistan,” says Paracha.

The larger project is that the villages can start selling the energy they are producing. A few Investors have put money into similar projects and the government is extremely supportive of these types of renewable energy projects.

A few field notes from Pakistan:

Pakistan has close ties with Turkey, and many Turkish consulting firms are moving into the region and establishing offices in oil and gas, flood rehabilitation, and they are also building facilities for energy storage. Investment in the millions has gone into developing wind and solar industries. Turkey is very comfortable working with companies in Pakistan.

In terms of grassroots activities the Alternative Energy Board of Pakistan has filed reports and studies on basic needs. The Paracha family has established an NGO addressing those needs called Vision of Development where the focus is micro financing. “Pakistan is in dire need of such projects and it is important that non-resident Pakistani’s contribute to improve the standard of living of Pakistan,” she says. Her parents have funded a few projects for their NGO, and they are constantly looking for additional funding for similar projects. Various models are being looked into by other influential families within the country.

Ethical farming and fair trade may be common with many of the coffee retailers in the UK and North America, while young people who visit coffee shops in Pakistan have caught onto to the trend. “One of the biggest fads here is coffee shops,” says Paracha. “A few of the cafes are now going green and they buy fair trade beans. Some restaurants are going green as well by purchasing locally and organically grown products, implementing power saving mechanisms and the use of recycled material. This is creating a trend in the country which is slowly being followed by others.”

Recycling bottles and non-biodegradable materials is important for a densely populated Pakistan to consider. Natasha reports that there are a few organizations working in this niche namely WasteBusters based in Lahore working in the Punjab province. “Recycling is a huge problem in Pakistan. There are a lot of landfills and very little is being done to address the issue. We are trying our best to lay the foundations for this right now.

“The focus within the country is to move towards cost effective and technically efficient renewable resources.”

Want to help Pakistan accelerate its renewable energy market? Green Prophet is collecting contacts and ideas for Pakistani stakeholders in the English-speaking diaspora. Email karin@greenprophet.com for more.

The post Meet the “Miss Pakistan” of Renewable Energy appeared first on Green Prophet.