The trend of natural disaster occurrence in Pakistan during 1980-2026 reflects a clear long-term rise in the frequency of disaster events, highlighting the country’s increasing exposure and vulnerability to natural hazards, according to Pakistan Economic Survey 2025-26 released today.
According to the survey, during the 1980s, the number of recorded disasters remained relatively low, generally fluctuating between 0 and 4 events annually (Figure 1). However, from the early 1990s onward, disaster occurrence began to increase gradually, with more frequent fluctuations in recurring years.
A more pronounced escalation in the occurrence of the disaster is visible after 2000, when annual disaster events repeatedly crossed the range of 6 to 11 incidents. Several peak years were recorded during the mid-2000s and, most notably, after 2015, indicating a growing pattern of recurrent natural disasters, including floods, storms, heatwaves, droughts, landslides and other extreme climatic events. The year 2023 proved to the most disaster-prone year in 43 years with 13 natural events recorded, demonstrating the intensified incidence of the disaster risks in the country.
The upward-sloping trend line further depicts that natural disasters are becoming more frequent over time rather than isolated or cyclical events thereby highlighting the urgency of strengthened climate resilience, disaster preparedness and integrated risk management.
The survey says 2015-2025 are the hottest eleven years on record, with 2025 ranking as the second or third warmest year in the 176-year observational record, at about 1.43 °C above the 1850-1900 average. This sustained warming is primarily driven by increasing concentrations of heat-trapping greenhouse gases. Among key indicators, the greenhouse gases data show that in 2024 atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations reached their highest level since its measurements began in 1957 due to continued fossil fuel emissions and reduced effectiveness of land and ocean carbon sinks. This increase along with rise in methane and nitrous oxide gases have upset the Earth’s energy balance, particularly over the past two decades, reaching a new high in 2025.
Consistent with this, the indicator of ocean heat content reached a new record high in 2025, exceeding the previous record set in 2024 and of the past nine years. Although 2025 is marked by the shift towards La Niña conditions that temporarily cool the planet, around 90 percent of the ocean surface experienced at least one marine heatwave in 2025. Further, the indicator of global mean sea level, in 2025 remained near the record highs observed in 2024 thereby continued to damage coastal ecosystems and contribute to groundwater salinization and flooding.
At the same time, glacier mass loss and declining sea-ice continue to signal rapid cryosphere changes. In the 2024-2025 hydrological year, glacier mass loss was among the five worst on record since 1950. These ocean warming and sea-level rise are projected to continue in the coming centuries and much of this is long-term and irreversible in nature. Further, the world continued to experience extreme events.
Thus, the rapid and large-scale changes in the earth system are creating cascading impacts on both human and natural systems thereby, causing food insecurity and displacement, especially in countries with high vulnerability and low adaptive capacity.
While air pollution has long been recognized as a persistent global hazard, but 2025 marked a turning point as the crisis moved to the forefront on the international agenda after being placed at a top ranked global risk by the World Economic Forum’s Global Risks Report 202510. The 2025 IQAir World Air Quality Report11 highlights continued deterioration of global air quality,