Dawn
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08:00 May 20, 2025
Fareeha, 43, who lives in Karachi’s Ibrahim Hyderi with her family, remembers all too well what it feels like to walk on water, or wade through it. For generations, her family relied on Badin’s salty waters for fishing, but seawater intrusion turned freshwater ponds brackish and fertile lands barren. This change, steady but not slow, left Fareeha in dire financial straits, forcing her husband and sons to work at brick kilns. But this wasn’t a permanent solution, she says. “The sea took our nets, then our dignity … we were eventually forced to move out.” Fareeha’s plight resonates with almost 80 per cent of other fishing families in Badin, where, without compensation or adaptation, climate poverty has pushed hundreds into a chaotic storm of displacement. While climate change is a global issue, its impacts, unfortunately, are spread disproportionately across the world. Despite having minimal contributions towards global greenhouse gas emissions, low-income countries tend to be extremely vulnerable to the disast...