In the third of our interviews with AKDN climate experts, we ask two South Asians who live and work at the frontiers of environmental and climate change about their work. How have things changed in their lifetime? How can the effects be mitigated? And what will the next generation face?

The pace of climate change is increasing. What changes has each interviewee observed? How is the Aga Khan Rural Support Programme helping?

“Sixty years back,” says Mohammad Zaman of Gilgit, Pakistan, “our huge mountains were lush green, with forests. But we are watching our glaciers melt. In the next 20 or 30 years, they will be gone. And people have cut the trees and bushes, and even dug out the artemisia plants to use as firewood.

“Now you can see these mountains are completely bare and they are really fragile and vulnerable to flash floods. I have witnessed many flash floods since 2010. Many people have been displaced. They move to other villages and even down-country. Last year, there was a huge flood in my village. 100 households had their land, animals and trees completely washed out, and 10 lives were lost.”

Zaman is the Agriculture and Climate-Resilient Programme Manager for the Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP) Pakistan, having first put his degrees in agriculture and natural resource management to work there in 1993. AKRSP has been working in India and Pakistan for just over 40 years. AKRSP (Pakistan) works in Gilgit-Baltistan to develop infrastructure such as roads and irrigation systems, increase agricultural productivity and build up 5,000 local institutions covering almost 200,000 households.

“Back in the 90s,” recalls Zaman, “there was huge donor funding for the natural resource management sector. We did a lot of activities in agriculture, livestock and forestry, planting around 47 million forest trees, of native species, which the local communities would then look after. We didn’t link these environmental activities with climate change.

“In 2023 we planted a million forest trees of different native species. In the next five years we plan another five million. We are installing micro hydel schemes in off-grid areas, to provide renewable energy where government electricity is not available. People can use them for cooking and lighting instead of cutting down trees for firewood.

“Along the river there are plenty of barren patches. For those, we are installing solar lift irrigation pumps – 38 so far this year – to bring water from the river to those patches. Then we plant trees there, intercropped with alfalfa, which fixes nitrogen in the soil, expedites plant growth and prevents soil erosion. We encourage regenerative agriculture, avoiding chemical fertilisers and insecticides in favour of organic fertiliser and biochemicals, and searching for short duration, climate-resilient varieties of cereals and vegetables.”

AKRSP (Pakistan) helps establish community organisations, clustering them into local support organisations that can work with the government. They have good connections with the agriculture, livestock and forestry departments, and partner with the government on the Ten Billion Tree Tsunami Programme.

Harpalsinh Chudasama has been working with AKDN in Gujarat, India, for almost two and a half years as a Climate Change Research Manager at AKRSP (India). The organisation helps smallholders achieve food and nutrition security, income security and sustainability. It also generates non-agricultural employment for rural youth and supports community-based organisations to improve the quality of life in their areas. It has worked with over 3.5 million people, 60 percent of them women.

Harpal, too, has seen changes in his lifetime. The eastern part of India has started experiencing cyclones every couple of years. The monsoon period now starts later, with more dry spells between rainy days.

“In the parts of Gujarat where I spent my childhood, the monsoon would usually arrive by 15 June. But now it’s getting delayed to mid or even late July. Most of the farmers practise rainfed agriculture here, so if there is a light shower in the month of June, they will start sowing. But if there is then an elongated dry spell, the kharif (monsoon) crops such as cotton and groundnuts won’t survive. The farmers then have the work and expense of resowing, the growing period and harvest time extend into the rabi (winter) season, and planting the rabi crops late can affect their harvest.”

AKRSP’s climate adaptation work focuses on water and soil management, land development, forestry and other interventions. “For households, we promote micro-irrigation systems [sprinklers and drips], water conservation and storage,” says Harpal. “At the community level, we are working on building check dams [that reduce water velocity and increase surface water storage], bori bunds [structures with sandbags to reduce surface water flow and soil erosion, allowing water time to sink into the ground] and village ponds. We are also working on rainwater harvesting and groundwater recharge structures [to collect and store water underground] and on providing drinking water. What people don’t see is that all this is directly linked with climate action.”

Does climate change affect everyone equally?

For both Zaman and Harpal, women’s participation is central.

“Indirectly, climate change affects everyone equally,” says Zaman. “But the men leave to find work, so the women and adolescents are left behind in the villages. The women have to cope with the agriculture – cows, trees, vegetable gardens. So we give women priority when we offer fruit plants, vegetable seeds and even training. And when food support is needed, we give it to the women, because traditionally here the men eat the good food and the women get inferior quality food. But after 40 years of AKRSP here, women have better access to good food, village-level organisations, savings schemes and low-interest loans.”

Harpal emphasises women’s lack of authority and decision-making power. “Women experience the effects of climate change differently as they may not have access to resources or be able to make decisions in agricultural activities or for their households. They contribute equally, if not more, to agricultural activities – for example, if heavy rains affect the stored fodder, it is considered women’s work to dry it out; if there is an extended dry spell, the women will have to resow. But their male counterparts decide what to sow or how and when to take produce to the market.

And what of the future?

Zaman says: “The government has a plan to put climate change in the curriculum, so the children will be prepared for adaptation and mitigation, they will start thinking right now. If we do something right now, it will benefit our future generation. If we don't do anything now, they will suffer a lot.”

Harpal agrees: “In terms of climate impacts, things are going to get messier. But there is also more awareness locally, and I hope this will ultimately result in action.”

Read the rest of the series:

“Change requires collective action”: Onno Rühl discusses climate challenges

“A future full of climate champions”: A conversation with Hristo Dikanski, AKDN Climate Change Coordinator