LONDON: Climate change impacts, from hotter temperatures to more droughts and floods, threaten much of the world’s cotton production, risking worsening shortages, higher prices and financial woes for growers, researchers warned on Wednesday.
Protecting the $12-billion market — in countries such as India, the United States, Brazil and China — will require both slashing emissions to limit planetary heating and stepped-up efforts by farmers to adapt to the new risks, they said.
By 2040, 40 percent of cotton-producing regions are likely to see their growing seasons shortened by rising heat, while drought could hit half of the global crop, according to a report produced by Cotton 2040, an initiative working for a more sustainable and climate-resilient cotton industry.
Eventually, if efforts to cut emissions fail and warming ramps up in line with the harshest scientific projections, cotton could be dramatically reduced as a crop, leaving the industry “a shadow of what it is today,” said Sally Uren, chief executive of Forum for the Future, an international nonprofit that backs Cotton 2040.
But even with less warming, crop losses are likely to occur even as global cotton demand rises due to population increases and an expanding middle class in some developing nations.
While growers are rapidly becoming aware of rising climate risks, few companies that rely on cotton for their products know much about those threats, and consumers even less, Uren said.
The new analysis should serve as “a wake-up call for the cotton industry,” she added.
Extreme weather has already led to growing volatility in cotton prices. Large-scale floods in Pakistan in 2010, for example, caused global cotton prices to spike to nearly $2.50 from about $0.70 in 2009, the report noted.
Crop losses are proving particularly tough for millions of developing-world cotton farmers who make up about 90 percent of the world’s growers, the report said.
Crop failures could slash incomes among poorer growers who cannot afford to adapt to changing conditions or switch to climate-smarter crops, Uren told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
In India, where farmers are already struggling with severe droughts and water shortages, some cotton growers left with no money to restart production after their crops fail are committing suicide, she said.
Cotton-growing areas facing some of the biggest extreme weather risks include northern Sudan, Senegal and southern Mali in Africa, as well as parts of Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan, the report noted.
Efforts to adapt to changing conditions by shifting planting times, boosting irrigation and providing farmers with climate forecasts could help some cope better, the report noted.
But unless emissions are slashed, some cotton-growing areas will become unsuitable for the crop in the future, Uren predicted.
In those areas, governments should ensure a “just transition” for farmers, such as by helping them adopt new crops or providing social safety nets, she said.
Cotton-growing areas including Pakistan face world’s biggest extreme weather risks
https://arab.news/29man
Cotton-growing areas including Pakistan face world’s biggest extreme weather risks
- Large-scale floods in Pakistan in 2010 caused global cotton prices to spike
- Crop losses are proving tough for millions of cotton farmers who make up about 90 percent of the world’s growers
Pakistan graft survey echoes IMF warning on weak governance, public dissatisfaction
- Most Pakistanis say they were not compelled to pay bribes, but distrust remains high in anti-corruption efforts
- PM Shahbaz Sharif calls report a recognition of his government’s efforts to fight corruption, promote transparency
ISLAMABAD: Governance weaknesses flagged by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) appeared to align with findings from Pakistan’s latest corruption perception survey, analysts said on Tuesday, as Transparency International Pakistan (TI-Pakistan) reported widespread public dissatisfaction with the state’s accountability mechanisms.
TI-Pakistan’s National Corruption Perception Survey (NCPS) 2025 found that 58 percent of respondents fully or partly agreed that the IMF program and Pakistan’s removal from the Financial Action Task Force’s grey list had helped stabilize the economy.
“Encouragingly, a majority of Pakistanis (66 percent) nationwide reported that they did not experience a situation where they felt compelled to offer a bribe to access any public service,” said the survey. “Sindh recorded the highest proportion of respondents paying a bribe to access public service (46 percent), followed by Punjab (39 percent), Balochistan (31 percent) and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (20 percent).”
In this context, 77 percent said they were unhappy with the government’s anti-corruption performance.
However, Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif expressed satisfaction over the report in a statement, saying “a large majority of citizens said they did not face corruption during our government’s tenure” which is “recognition of our efforts to fight corruption and promote transparency.”
“It is highly encouraging that most citizens considered the government’s measures for economic recovery to be successful,” he said.
“We worked on a priority basis to establish a system grounded in merit and transparency across all sectors of government, and we are continuing to build on these efforts,” he added.
Economist and former finance ministry adviser Dr. Khaqan Najeeb said the survey highlighted the same structural weaknesses identified by the IMF’s Governance and Corruption Diagnostic, published on Nov. 20 at the international lender’s request, which said Pakistan suffers from “persistent and widespread corruption vulnerabilities” rooted in a state-dominated economy, weak regulatory capacity, and inconsistent enforcement.
“Transparency International Pakistan’s National Corruption Perception Survey does suggest progress in reducing low-level, day-to-day bribery, but it does not contradict the IMF’s governance findings,” he told Arab News. “Instead, it highlights that Pakistan’s real challenge lies in deeper, systemic weaknesses in transparency, oversight and institutional accountability.”
“While public perception has improved, it does not mean the underlying governance issues identified by the IMF have been resolved,” he argued, adding that addressing those will require sustained reforms, stronger institutions and consistent enforcement.
Political analyst Mazhar Abbas said the report was going to be used by the government to bolster its economic narrative.
“Survey reports have usually been tilted in favor of the government, and this report is no different,” he told Arab News. “The government will certainly use it to support its narrative of an improved economy, as the report states that a majority of respondents partially or fully agree that the government has successfully stabilized the economy through the IMF agreement and by exiting the FATF grey list.”
Abbas added it was difficult to either challenge or endorse the findings of the report without knowing who was interviewed and who the respondents were.
“The police have consistently been at the top of Transparency International’s corruption perception reports, whereas there may be other organizations where the frequency and volume of corruption are even higher,” he continued, adding that since the police are a public-dealing organization and consistently top the corruption perception index, it suggested that most respondents are from the general public, who may either lack access to or knowledge of corrupt practices in other organizations.
Islamabad-based social-sector development consultant Muhammad Qasim Jan said the survey should be seen as a barometer of public sentiment rather than an empirical measure of corruption.
“The National Corruption Perception Survey 2025 offers a sobering snapshot of how Pakistanis view corruption and accountability,” he told Arab News. “At the same time, the absence of basic methodological detail means the results should be interpreted with caution, especially when citing national percentages or making population-wide claims.”
