Na COP27, Lula diz que pedirá à ONU para Brasil sediar a conferência em 2025

 

Lula no estande de governos da Amazônia Legal nesta quarta (16) pela manhã na COP27, no Egito - Joseph Eid/AFP

Lula e a mulher, Janja, na chegada à COP27 na manhã desta quarta (16), em Sharm el-Sheikh, no Egito - Mohammed Abed/AFP

Ana Carolina Amaral

Jéssica Maes

Phillippe Watanabe

Folha.com.br 

SHARM EL-SHEIKH (EGITO)

O presidente eleito Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (PT), recebido com corredores lotados na COP27, conferência do clima da ONU, no Egito, na manhã desta quarta-feira (16), anunciou que pedirá às Nações Unidas que o Brasil seja anfitrião do evento em 2025.

"Vamos falar com o secretário-geral da ONU e pedir para que a COP de 2025 seja feita no Brasil e na Amazônia", disse Lula.

"Se a Amazônia tem o significado que tem para o planeta Terra, se tem a importância que todos vocês dizem que tem, que os cientistas dizem que tem, nós não temos que medir nenhum esforço para convencer as pessoas de que uma árvore em pé, uma árvore viva, vale mais do que uma árvore derrubada", afirmou também, em evento no estande de governadores da Amazônia Legal.

A fala sobre o pedido do Brasil para sediar a COP30, em 2025, veio após sugestão de Helder Barbalho (MDB), governador do Pará, responsável pelo convite para Lula ir à COP27.

"Os estados da Amazônia alcançaram um nível de capacidade de relacionamento com organismos internacionais, com a sociedade civil, com instituições financeiras e até mesmo entre si que deve ser incentivado não pode mais retroceder", salientam.

O tema do desenvolvimento sustentável da região também é destacado. A carta lembra que a Amazônia foi explorada ao longo dos anos, mas isso não se reverteu em progresso para a população local. "O modelo de desenvolvimento vigente, para ser economicamente pujante, trouxe o custo de ser ambientalmente devastador e socialmente excludente."

Os governadores afirmam que seria necessário "aperfeiçoar as capacidades humanas e institucionais e mobilizar a ação empresarial" para que esse desenvolvimento seja alavancado por meio da bioeconomia, transformando a floresta em pé em "commodity".

"É necessário conjugar os saberes técnico e ancestral para que o potencial produtivo da Amazônia se expresse por meio do aproveitamento racional das vocações da região e com retorno justo e equânime para as populações locais", escrevem.

Lula, após a leitura, disse concordar com o conteúdo.

"Eu só queria que os governadores levassem em conta que eu assinaria esse documento de vocês sem nenhum problema porque é mais do que justo que nós recuperemos a aliança entre as unidades federativas para que o governo federal governe em comum acordo com os governadores, e mais ainda que o governo federal volte a governar em acordo com os prefeitos", afirmou.

Ao chegar ao pavilhão da COP27 nesta manhã, por volta das 11h15 no horário local (6h15 pelo horário de Brasília), antes de se posicionar diante do público, Lula se reuniu em uma sala com governadores de Acre, Mato Grosso, Pará e Tocantins, além do senador Randolfe Rodrigues (Rede-AP) e Fernando Haddad, que integra a comitiva do governo de transição.

Lula e a comitiva ingressaram no evento usando credenciais de "país anfitrião", como convidados do governo do Egito.

Quase três horas antes do início previsto do evento, pessoas já se reuniam no pavilhão do consórcio dos governadores da Amazônia na COP27 —o estande de 120m2 ficou completamente lotado em pouco tempo.

Além de membros da imprensa nacional e internacional, que disputavam espaço para conseguir montar suas câmeras e tripés, membros da sociedade civil e parlamentares também tentaram garantir seus assentos desde cedo. Entre eles estavam o deputado Alessandro Molon (PSB-RJ) e Airton Faleiro (PT-PA).

No entanto, seguranças da ONU esvaziaram totalmente o espaço antes da chegada de Lula sob a justificativa de garantir a segurança do presidente eleito.

Na aglomeração que se formou durante a espera, os apoiadores, em especial os indígenas, puxaram coros de músicas de campanha.

Na entrada de Lula, jornalistas perguntaram ao petista como recebe as críticas por se deslocar à COP27 usando um jatinho do empresário José Seripieri Filho, conhecido como Júnior, fundador da Qualicorp e dono da QSaúde. Em resposta, o presidente eleito acenou e disse que falará depois sobre a questão.

Ainda nesta quarta, Lula fará um pronunciamento no espaço da ONU. Na quinta (17), ele se encontra às 10h (hora local, 5h do horário de Brasília) com representantes da sociedade civil brasileira e, às 15h (10h no horário de Brasília), participa do Fórum Internacional dos Povos Indígenas/Fórum dos Povos sobre Mudança Climática.

A repórter Jéssica Maes viajou a Sharm el-Sheikh, no Egito, a convite do Instituto Clima e Sociedade (iCS).

USA, China, Brazil

O projeto Planeta em Transe é apoiado pela Open Society Foundations.

Australian budget forecasts heavy hit to economy due to floods and natural disasters

 

Federal budget estimates growth will lose about quarter of a percentage point during the current quarter, or about $5bn in economic activity, because of recent flooding

The increasing frequency of natural disasters will take its toll on the economy in the near term and force the government to fork out hundreds of millions of dollars to build resilience for more to come.

As Australia endures its third La Niña event in as many years, the budget estimates growth will lose about quarter of a percentage point during the current quarter, or about $5bn in economic activity, because of the recent flooding across the country’s south-east.

While the rebuilding in subsequent quarters – extreme weather permitting – will add back to economic activity, the repair bill won’t be cheap and excludes other impacts such as the mental health of communities hit.

The floods will also significantly add to cost-of-living pressures by increasing the price of fruit and vegetables and reducing activity in agriculture, mining and construction, the budget said.

Based on preliminary analysis, the October floods alone will add 0.1 percentage points to inflation in both the December and March quarters.

Inflation, though, is still tipped to peak at 7.75% by the end of 2022 as lower than expected petrol prices relieve some of the pressure.

To address the impact of this year’s floods, there is $3bn in the contingency reserve to meet disaster recovery costs, including support payments to individuals, communities and businesses.

Some $38.3m will also be funnelled into Disaster Relief Australia to fund 5,000 extra volunteers.

As of 20 October, disaster assistance has been made available in 94 local government areas across Victoria, Tasmania and New South Wales due to the recent flooding events – representing around 30% of total agricultural production value in the 2020-21 period.

To prepare for future disasters, up to $200m per year will be budgeted towards prevention and resilience initiatives through the Disaster Ready Fund, funding projects such as flood levees, sea walls, cyclone shelters, evacuation centres and fire breaks.

Over the six-month period of the February, March and July floods, Services Australia provided nearly $3.2bn in assistance to 3.3 million claimants.

In disaster-prone communities, $22.6m will be provided over four years to help with insurance affordability and availability. The money will fund the establishment of new partnerships with the insurance industry on risk reduction and “inform mitigation projects that reduce premiums for Australian households”.

According to the Climate Council, large parts of Australia will be uninsurable by 2030 due to the risk of climate change.

Caitlin Cassidy and Peter Hannam Theguardian

There's Something in the Water in Virginia. Before You Say 'Yuck,' Wait.

Elena Shao

Virginia doesn’t have a megadrought like some parts of the United States, but it has water problems all the same: Homes and businesses in the Hampton Roads region, in the southeastern corner of the state, are drawing groundwater out faster than it can be replenished. The situation has gotten so bad that the earth is sinking in some places.

Officials, though, think they might have found a solution in the sewers. Every day, the region’s sanitation system takes 1 million gallons of treated wastewater and pumps it back into the Potomac Aquifer, a major source of drinking water for the area. And there are plans to increase that to 100 million gallons in the coming years.

Around the country, cities and towns are increasingly turning to treated wastewater to augment their supplies of drinking water. The number of drinking-water reuse projects has quadrupled over the past two decades, according to data collected by the National Alliance for Water Innovation, a research program funded by the U.S. Department of Energy.

“It is now necessary for us to consider options that would, in previous generations, be considered unthinkable,” said Michael Kiparsky, director of the Wheeler Water Institute at the University of California, Berkeley.

In the case of coastal Virginia, the goal is to stabilize groundwater to address two increasingly urgent problems. First, underground water depletion has led the ground to slowly sink and collapse in some places.

Homes and industries in the area draw around 155 million gallons of groundwater each day. Natural replenishment is much slower in confined aquifers like the Potomac, where layers of impermeable clays and rocks beneath the surface make it hard for rainwater to seep back into the ground.

Even if people stopped drawing groundwater today, it could still take thousands of years for the aquifer to refill, said Mark Bennett, who runs the Virginia and West Virginia Water Science Center for the U.S. Geological Survey.

Meanwhile, without enough water to help support the ground, underlying sediments fall in on themselves and the surface collapses.

The second big problem is that, as more and more freshwater gets pumped out, the loss of pressure has left the aquifer vulnerable to saltwater contamination as denser seawater encroaches underground.

In low-lying coastal areas like Hampton Roads, climate change exacerbates that problem. That’s because as temperatures rise, ocean water expands in volume, causing sea levels to rise. And, glaciers on land melt at a faster rate, adding even more water to the oceans.

That all leads to increased flood risk and helps saltwater intrude into freshwater sources.

A number of cities in the Hampton Roads region, like Virginia Beach and Norfolk, are less than 10 feet above sea level on average. Sea levels have already risen nearly 18 inches in the region in the past century, according to data from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

In response to the growing threats, the Hampton Roads Sanitation District, which manages wastewater in the region, began taking a more direct approach to groundwater replenishment in 2018 with a project called the Sustainable Water Initiative for Tomorrow, or SWIFT.

Although other water authorities around the country, such as the Orange County Water District in California, have injected treated wastewater into underground aquifers to serve as barriers against seawater intrusion, the project was the first effort to do so in Virginia.

In fact, the state had no regulatory framework in place to oversee the underground injection of water. So, the sanitation district had to push for legislation to create oversight — an unusual situation, Kiparsky said, because you rarely see water districts asking for more regulation.

Today, the district’s sewage systems capture wastewater and send it through wastewater treatment plants to remove nutrients and bacteria.

Then, each day at the SWIFT research center in Suffolk, Virginia, 1 million gallons of that water goes through additional treatment that disinfects, filters out harmful contaminants and viruses, and brings the water up to drinking quality. The advanced treatment plant also adjusts things like acidity and dissolved oxygen levels so the water is appropriate for the aquifer.

It is essentially a “tricked-out drinking water plant,” said Charles Bott, the district’s director of water technology and research.

The treated water goes into the Potomac Aquifer via a recharge well 12 inches in diameter that releases it at intermittent levels between 500 and 1,400 feet below the surface. The aquifer acts as an environmental buffer, essentially providing another level of treatment as the water filters slowly through the soils, a process that can remove some viruses and micropollutants.

By 2032, the district expects to treat and pump up to 100 million gallons of wastewater each day into the aquifer that would otherwise be released into the Elizabeth, James or York rivers. In addition to shoring up the aquifer, the project should also, when fully implemented, eliminate about 90% of the district’s wastewater discharge.

Turning wastewater into drinkable water is expensive. The next full-scale SWIFT plant, which will treat up to 16 million gallons of wastewater a day, is expected to cost upward of $650 million, funded in part by customer fees and loans from the Environmental Protection Agency. That does not include maintenance and day-to-day operation, which will cost an estimated $7.2 million a year.

But the sanitation district has calculated that putting wastewater through more intense treatment will help it get ahead on the costs of complying with increasingly stringent rules regulating pollution from the hundreds of treatment plants that regularly discharge wastewater into the Chesapeake Bay.

Planners expect the rules, which are mainly focused on excess nutrients that can harm marine life, to become more strict over time, said Jamie Mitchell, the Hampton Roads district’s chief of technical services. It wouldn’t be cost effective to make incremental upgrades “every five or 10 years to address new regulations,” she said.

So far, the system appears to be “a win-win-win situation,” said Kiparsky, because it addressed a range of issues: Land subsidence and saltwater intrusion, nutrient pollution in the Chesapeake Bay and growing costs for the district.

Even though the project is still in the early stages, researchers at the U.S. Geological Survey have already noted slight improvements in the aquifer.

Not long ago, such an idea would probably have been dismissed as too expensive and too unpleasant. Efforts in the 1990s to develop water reuse in San Diego and Los Angeles, for instance, were beaten back by activists who denounced what they called a “toilet to tap” system.

Today, the growing acceptance of wastewater reuse projects reflects a calculus that local governments increasingly have to consider as they confront pressures on water supply from climate change and population growth — even in the regions that don’t face prolonged drought.

There are similar projects in California and other drought-stricken states like Texas that, in some cases, impose mandatory water restrictions on homes and businesses to cut down on consumption. Some of them even directly route treated wastewater for use as drinking water, without an environmental buffer like an aquifer.

One of the big advantages of wastewater, Kiparsky noted, is that there’s always a reliable supply. He said using it to recharge aquifers was a complex but effective way of accomplishing a basic goal: returning water to where it came from.

“It’s closing the loop on the urban water cycle,” he said.

 

Brazil - Geração Solar Distribuída ultrapassa Itaipu com 14 GW de potência instalada

 

Segundo o presidente da Absolar, Rodrigo Sauaia, apesar de ainda não ter acabado, 2022 já é o melhor ano da energia solar já registrado no Brasil na última década

Segundo a Absolar, a tecnologia solar fotovoltaica já está presente em 5.509 municípios e em todos os estados brasileiros

A energia solar acaba de ultrapassar a marca de 14 gigawatts (GW) de potência instalada em residências, comércios, indústrias, produtores rurais e prédios públicos no Brasil, a chamada geração distribuída (GD).

Com a nova marca, a GD supera a usina hidrelétrica binacional de Itaipu, segunda maior hidrelétrica do mundo e a maior das Américas, informou a Associação Brasileira de Energia Solar (Absolar) ao Broadcast, sistema de notícias em tempo real do Grupo Estado.

Para o presidente da Absolar, Rodrigo Sauaia, apesar de ainda não ter acabado, 2022 já é o melhor ano da energia solar já registrado no Brasil na última década. A geração própria de energia solar seguirá crescendo a passos largos e deverá praticamente dobrar sua potência operacional instalada, avalia o executivo.

“Do final de 2021 para outubro deste ano, a geração própria (GD) de energia solar saltou de 8,4 GW para 14 GW de potência instalada, um crescimento 66,7%, enquanto os investimentos saltaram neste período de R$ 42,4 bilhões para R$ 76,7 bilhões, um aumento de 80,9%”, informa.

Na análise de Ronaldo Koloszuk, presidente do Conselho de Administração da Absolar, o crescimento acelerado dos sistemas fotovoltaicos em residências e pequenos negócios está ligado a fatores como o alto custo da energia elétrica no país, o barateamento dos preços do sistema solar e o período de transição previsto na lei, que garante até 2045 a manutenção das regras atuais aos consumidores que instalarem um sistema solar no telhado até janeiro de 2023.

80 dias

Os consumidores brasileiros que pretendem instalar sistemas de energia solar em residências e empresas têm menos de 80 dias para solicitar o sistema fotovoltaico antes das mudanças de regras aprovadas pelo Congresso Nacional.

Pela Lei nº 14.300/2022, publicada no início deste ano, há um período de transição que garante até 2045 a manutenção das regras atuais aos consumidores que solicitarem o parecer de acesso de sistemas de geração própria de solar até o final de 6 de janeiro de 2023.

De acordo com a entidade, o país possui atualmente mais de 1,3 milhão de sistemas solares fotovoltaicos conectados à rede. Desde 2012, foram mais de R$ 76,7 bilhões em novos investimentos, que geraram mais de 420 mil empregos acumulados no período, espalhados em todas as regiões do Brasil, e uma arrecadação de R$ 17,9 bilhões.

Segundo a Absolar, a tecnologia solar fotovoltaica já está presente em 5.509 municípios e em todos os estados brasileiros, sendo que os estados líderes em potência instalada são, respectivamente: Minas Gerais, São Paulo, Rio Grande do Sul, Mato Grosso e Santa Catarina.

A fonte lidera com folga o segmento de geração distribuída, com mais de 99,9% das instalações do país. Em número de sistemas instalados, os consumidores residenciais estão no topo da lista, com 78,8% das conexões.

Em seguida, aparecem os pequenos negócios dos setores de comércio e serviços (11,4%), consumidores rurais (7,9%), indústrias (1,7%), poder público (0,3%) e outros tipos, como serviços públicos (0,02%) e iluminação pública (0,005%).

Em potência instalada, os consumidores residenciais lideram o uso da energia solar, com 48,4% da potência instalada no país, seguidos de perto pelos pequenos negócios dos setores de comércio e serviços (29,8%), consumidores rurais (13,9%), indústrias (6,8%), poder público (1,1%) e outros tipos, como serviços públicos (0,1%) e iluminação pública (0,01%).

13/02/2020REUTERS/Amanda Perobelli

Denise Luna, do Estadão Conteúdo

Nigeria floods: 'Overwhelming' disaster leaves more than 600 people dead

By Ishaq Khalid & Elsa Maishman

BBC News, Abuja & London

Recent flooding in Nigeria has become an "overwhelming" disaster, and many states were not properly prepared for them despite warnings, the minister for disaster management has said.

More than 600 people have died in the worst flooding the West African nation has seen in a decade.

Some 1.3 million people have been displaced, and more than 200,000 homes have been destroyed.

Flooding is expected to continue until the end of November.

Nigeria is used to seasonal flooding, but this year has been significantly worse than usual.

The government has said unusually heavy rains and climate change are to blame.

 The emergency release of excess water from dams both in Nigeria and in neighbouring Cameroon was another key factor causing devastating flooding.

Experts also say poor planning and infrastructure have exacerbated the damage.

Since the flooding began in early summer, large swathes of farmland have been destroyed.

There are concerns about increased spread of disease, and food and fuel supplies have also been disrupted.

In a press conference on Sunday, Nigeria's minister for humanitarian affairs and disaster management, Sadiya Umar Farouk, called on local authorities to evacuate people living in the most high-risk areas.

Authorities are already providing food and other support to those affected, she said.

She added that despite ''concerted efforts'' and early warnings, many state governments "did not prepare" for the flooding.

The disaster has affected 27 of Nigeria's 36 states.

Part of the problem is that people return to their homes on flood plains each year after the water levels subside.

Many do not have the means to relocate.

Nigeria's economy has been battered in the past year, with inflation at an all-time high and many communities struggling to cope.

The World Food Programme and the UN's Food and Agriculture Organisation said last month that Nigeria was among six countries facing a high risk of catastrophic levels of hunger.

Nigeria's meteorological agency has warned that the flooding could continue until the end of November in some states in the south of the country, including Anambra, Delta, Rivers, Cross River and Bayelsa.

Seca no verão da Europa seria “improvável” sem mudanças climáticas, diz estudo.

Onda de calor em Paris expõe falta de árvores na cidade.

Christian Edwardsda CNN

A seca no Hemisfério Norte neste verão – que chamuscou o solo, secou rios e provocou quebras de safra em massa — se tornou pelo menos 20 vezes mais provável pela crise climática, segundo uma nova análise.

A pesquisa, publicada na quarta-feira (5) pela iniciativa World Weather Attribution, descobriu que sem a crise climática, a seca que atingiu áreas da América do Norte, Ásia e Europa neste verão seria historicamente um evento de 1 em 400 anos – o que significa que foi um uma seca tão intensa que só seria vista uma vez a cada 400 anos em média.

Mas o aquecimento global causado pela queima de combustíveis fósseis tornou uma seca dessa magnitude uma ocorrência de 1 em 20 anos, descobriram os cientistas.

As altas temperaturas experimentadas neste verão, que contribuíram para a seca e mataram dezenas de milhares de pessoas na Europa e na China, teriam sido “praticamente impossíveis” sem as mudanças climáticas, segundo a análise.

Pesquisadores usaram dados históricos, observações e modelagem científica, comparando as condições do clima de hoje – que é cerca de 1,2ºC mais quente do que antes da industrialização – com o clima que o precedeu, antes do final do século 19.

“O verão de 2022 no Hemisfério Norte é um bom exemplo de como os eventos extremos causados ​​pelas mudanças climáticas também podem ocorrer em grandes regiões em períodos de tempo mais longos. Também mostra como a combinação de muitas mudanças diferentes no clima pode danificar nossa infraestrutura e sobrecarregar nossos sistemas sociais”, disse Freiderike Otto, cientista do clima do Imperial College London e um dos autores do estudo, em comunicado.

“Na Europa, as condições de seca levaram a colheitas reduzidas. Isso foi particularmente preocupante, pois ocorreu após uma onda de calor alimentada pelas mudanças climáticas no sul da Ásia que também destruiu as colheitas e aconteceu em um momento em que os preços globais dos alimentos já estavam extremamente altos devido à guerra na Ucrânia”.

mbora grande parte do hemisfério tenha experimentado chuvas abaixo da média este ano, a análise descobriu que o aumento das temperaturas foi o principal fator por trás da seca.

Os cientistas também observaram que suas descobertas eram conservadoras e que “a influência real das atividades humanas é provavelmente maior” do que o declarado no relatório.

Em todo o Hemisfério Norte neste verão, calor extremo e chuvas baixas levaram a vários eventos sem precedentes: a China emitiu seu primeiro alerta nacional de seca; o Reino Unido registrou sua temperatura mais alta de todos os tempos; A Europa experimentou seu verão mais quente; e a crise hídrica no oeste dos EUA se intensificou, levando a novos cortes no uso da água.

Juntamente com o perigo imediato para a vida, o calor extremo do verão representou graves ameaças à infraestrutura, indústria e abastecimento de alimentos, alimentando a crise contínua do custo de vida em muitas das regiões afetadas.

A Europa já lutava contra choques geopolíticos para suprir. Esse choque induzido pelo clima “agravou ainda mais a crise do custo de vida, agravando os impactos da guerra na Ucrânia”, disse Maarten van Aalst, outro dos autores do relatório e diretor do Centro Climático da Cruz Vermelha do Crescente Vermelho.

“Estamos testemunhando a impressão digital das mudanças climáticas não apenas em riscos específicos”, disse van Aalst, “mas também na cascata de impactos em setores e regiões”.

O que está por vir

Os cientistas são cada vez mais capazes de quantificar a ligação entre a crise climática e os eventos climáticos extremos. Eles também podem fazer projeções com mais precisão.

O Hemisfério Norte pode esperar temperaturas extremas – como as experimentadas neste verão – com muito mais frequência, segundo a análise.

“Esse resultado também nos dá uma visão do que está por vir”, disse Dominik Schumacher, pesquisador do Instituto de Ciências Atmosféricas e Climáticas da ETH Zurique. “Com mais aquecimento global, podemos esperar secas de verão mais fortes e mais frequentes no futuro.”

Nesse caso, a escassez de água, incêndios florestais, quebras de safra, preços mais altos de alimentos e fornecimento de eletricidade esgotado experimentados nos últimos meses podem se tornar comuns.

O estudo segue não apenas um verão de clima extremo, mas também uma temporada de furacões e tufões destrutivos. O número de mortos do furacão Ian nos EUA ultrapassou 100. O tufão Noru atingiu as Filipinas recentemente, depois de se intensificar rapidamente do equivalente a um furacão de categoria 1 para um furacão de categoria 5 em cerca de seis horas.

Em novembro, os líderes mundiais se reunirão no Egito para a COP27, a Conferência das Nações Unidas sobre Mudanças Climáticas, onde os eventos climáticos extremos deste ano provavelmente aumentarão a urgência das discussões.

Sonia Seneviratne, também professora da ETH Zurich, disse: “Precisamos eliminar gradualmente a queima de combustíveis fósseis se quisermos estabilizar as condições climáticas e evitar um agravamento ainda maior desses eventos de seca, que se tornarão mais frequentes e mais intensos com qualquer aumento adicional do aquecimento global”.

Pakistan ‘It is beyond bleak’: Pakistan floods affecting 16m children, says Unicef

 Devastating conditions were triggered by heavy monsoon rains that have so far killed more than 1,500 people

Zeeshan Chandio with his son Nadeem Chandio, whose stomach has swollen. Photograph: Shah Meer Baloch/the Guardian

All four of Haliman’s daughters have fallen sick after she left her flood-ravaged house in her village in Qambar Shahdadkot district in the Sindh province of Pakistan. Two of her daughters have a recurring fever and two have skin diseases.

“I have never seen such diseases. The skin on my eldest daughter’s feet is peeling off,” said Haliman, sitting on a charpoy in a girls’ college in Larkana, where she had sought refuge along with a hundred others. “It is because of the floods and she waded through the flood water with me for hours. It is not only her feet, but her back, thighs and neck have bumpy rashes.”

Devastating floods in Pakistan triggered by heavy monsoon rains have killed more than 1,500 people, including 528 children, and affected about 16 million children, according to Unicef. Authorities say the waters that have washed away homes, roads, crops, livestocks and people will take at least three to six months to recede.

Floods have also brought water-borne diseases. “Millions of people are living under the open sky,” the Pakistani prime minister, Shehbaz Sharif, told the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, last week. “Water is giving rise to the water-borne diseases.” He has urged the world to focus on the impact on children.

Haliman said her daughters are suffering. “The skin diseases are getting worse and the fever of my daughters is also not going down. I am not getting any reasonable treatment here.”

At least 3.4 million girls and boys remain in need of immediate, lifesaving support. Unicef Pakistan’s representative, Abdullah Fadil, warned that without a massive increase in support, many more children would die. “The situation for Pakistani families is beyond bleak, and malnourished children are battling diarrhoea and malaria, dengue fever, and many are suffering from painful skin conditions,” he said.

Rawat Khan, 47, holding her daughter Iqra, whose ear became discoloured and blemished with small, pus-filled spots, said these diseases were not common before but now all the children were getting sick. Her son’s chest was swollen too.

“The doctors are asking us to get tests done in Karachi … but we cannot afford that. We don’t have money. We lost our houses and savings in the floods,” she said.

“We only saved our lives. We could save nothing else. We are helpless to see our children falling sick and we are unable to do anything about it. The government has failed us.”

Zeeshan Chandio, who comes from an affected village in Sindh province, held his son Nadeem in his arms. “I too want help and I don’t know what’s wrong with my son. His stomach is not well and belly is swollen.”

Dr Faiq Ali, who arranged a medical camp in Warah, a village in Qambar Shahdadkot, one of the most affected districts in Sindh province, said he saw more than 300 children on Sunday and all had various conditions such as malaria, diarrhoea and skin diseases.

“These all are water-borne diseases. You see standing water in the flooded areas where mosquitoes are rampant and people don’t have clean drinking water and they walk in the contaminated water and drink the same water. Everything is so bleak,” Ali said.

He added that a large part of the population was affected and this was on a large scale.

“Sadly, the government is not active in a way that it should be as we have not seen such disasters before. The National Disaster and Management Authority is also not playing an active role. We will see a bigger disaster in the shape of diseases in near future if the government stays inactive,” Ali warned.

Many flood-affected victims in Larkana said they were living in the constituency of the foreign minister, Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, and he had not visited them. They asked for his help for their children.

Jaffarabad, one of the most affected towns in Balochistan, which along with Sindh are the worst-hit provinces, represents the same bleak image where children are falling sick.

A woman, who requested anonymity, consoled her child in her lap. “We don’t get medicine, treatment, food or anything for our children. My son has been vomiting for days but I don’t know the cause of his sickness,” she said.

Fadil said that Pakistani children were paying the price for a climate disaster that was not of their own making and the world should help them so they could rebuild the lives of millions of vulnerable children in the coming months.

“Apart from rise in diseases, education for children is our main concern,” he said. “In 81 calamity-hit districts, the children are missing schools and even before this disaster in Pakistan more than 50% children are out of school.

“We don’t know when they will go back to school and that’s worrying and particularly for girls in these districts, whether their parents will send them to school or get them married. In Pakistan, early marriages are nothing new.”

Zeeshan Ahmed Khan, nine, was studying in grade 3 when his school was flooded with water. “I got new books when the new session started but they got damaged in the flood,” he said.

Allah Warayu had just moved to 4th class when half of his school was drowned in water. “I miss school and my friends but I have no idea where they are. Only my cousin is here with me and I have no idea where and how my other classmates are,” he added.

Fadil said he had seen girls reading and studying in tents and camps for the first time in their lives.

“I have seen young girls who, for the first time in their lives, hold pencils and books in their hands in the tents. They asked us to continue it. This was the most powerful and joyous thing I had seen. It must continue it and make sure all girls and children go to school.”