Increase in Greenhouse Effect

The term global warming means increase in greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect is a natural process by which the earth holds some of the energy of sunrays, and utilizes it to warm it enough to sustain life on it. The human activities like burning of fossil fuels, excessive smoke discharges from factories and the depletion of forests have led to an increase in the concentration of the greenhouse gases, mainly carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, in the earth’s outer atmosphere which are responsible for trapping excessive heat inside the environment and thus increasing the overall temperature of the earth, leading to the phenomenon of global warming . Global warming has emerged as one of the major threats to our planet in this century. It has been proved that due to the increase of the greenhouse gases in our outer atmosphere, the earth’s temperature has warmed by 0.74°C over the last 100 years, leading to floods, famines, droughts and cyclones among other natural disasters. The major part of the Pakistani land is dry and barren, mainly because of the great variability in the climatic parameters. The major water resource of Pakistan is the melting snow from the Himalayan glaciers, as well as the heavy monsoon rainfalls.

Although Pakistan itself contributes very little to the overall emissions of the greenhouse gases, yet it remains one of the most severely hit countries of the world by the process of global warming . Global warming has affected the climate of Pakistan in the form of melting of glaciers, recurrent flooding, and droughts.