Youth for Climate Action: Local Solutions for Gilgit-Baltistan

Introduction

As a Climate Change student, I have become increasingly interested in understanding environmental issues not only from an academic perspective but also through personal observations and discussions with people in my community. This article reflects on some of the environmental challenges I have observed, particularly disaster preparedness, public awareness, climate-change activities, and environmental funding.

A Vulnerable Region, An Unprepared Society

Gilgit-Baltistan (GB) is a highly vulnerable region. Different types of disasters occur here every year, creating serious problems and causing fear and anxiety among local communities. Alerts are issued at various times, but adequate training and public awareness remain limited. People often do not know what to do during a disaster or how to protect themselves and their communities. As a result, they face significant and often avoidable losses.

Environmental and Climate-Change Funding

This raises an important question about funding. When we discuss environmental change, environmental science, and climate change, how much funding is actually allocated to these areas?

I have also heard about the diversion of 1% of development funds into a consolidated Climate Fund account, reportedly amounting to PKR 293,075,000 (Rs 293.075 million). This raises several questions: Where is this fund being used? What is its purpose, and which activities does it support? Is the funding reaching the departments and people who genuinely want to work on these issues?

Climate-Change Conferences and Awareness Activities

A related issue concerns the many conferences and awareness activities organised around climate change. Some organisations receive international funding in the name of vulnerable communities and use it to organise conferences and lectures. However, can meaningful, long-term progress on an issue as vast as climate change be achieved through conferences and lectures alone?

Often, a conference or awareness session is held at a university, bringing together a large number of students. Certificates, refreshments, and other incentives are offered to encourage participation. Yet some students may not be genuinely interested in the topic. Their attention often shifts to their phones, and they do not fully engage with the discussions. At times, it appears that some students attend mainly for the refreshments or certificates.

There is also an irony worth noting. At climate-change conferences, we discuss pollution, cleanliness, and environmental protection, yet the events themselves can generate waste. This includes paper used for certificates, wrappers and packaging from refreshments, and litter left behind after eating and drinking. Crowding and disorder can also occur during the distribution of refreshments, with wrappers sometimes left behind when participants leave.

In this way, an event intended to address climate change and reduce pollution can itself contribute to environmental waste. This raises the question of whether the benefits of such activities outweigh the waste generated and the time spent. Time, especially for young people, is valuable and should be directed towards activities that produce practical and lasting benefits.

Between Nature’s Fury and Human Failure: Where Does the Youth Fit In?

Over the past 20 years, numerous climate-change adaptation initiatives have been implemented in Gilgit-Baltistan, including early warning systems, glacial lake monitoring, flood-protection walls, and community adaptation programmes. Yet homes, roads, farmland, and lives continue to be affected by floods, glacial lake outburst floods, landslides, and heatwaves. This raises a difficult question: Are these disasters too severe to manage, or are existing projects failing to provide the protection communities need?

The reality likely lies somewhere in between. Glaciers in the Karakoram and Hindu Kush regions are being affected by climate change, while some natural hazards are beyond the capacity of any single project to address. Nevertheless, weaknesses in planning and implementation cannot be overlooked.

Plans are often developed without sufficient input from local communities. Some projects are poorly maintained after donor support ends, while others may be built in unsuitable locations. In many cases, communities are not adequately informed about the projects intended to protect them. When a protective wall fails or a warning system does not work, public trust declines, making future initiatives more difficult to implement.

This is where young people can make a difference. Youth in Gilgit-Baltistan understand the local terrain, speak local languages, and will live with the consequences of today’s decisions. With knowledge of environmental science, data collection, and disaster preparedness, they can help monitor projects, identify problems at an early stage, and support communities in understanding disaster risks.

Their voices should not be an afterthought. An informed, capable, and engaged youth population can help make climate adaptation projects more effective and improve community resilience.

My Observations and Reflections

A similar problem exists in classroom education. Students are taught the definitions, causes, effects, and precautions related to climate change, but practical implementation rarely accompanies the theory. Often, the same presentations taken from the internet are reused, and teaching remains limited to reading slides. As a result, students may not fully understand the seriousness of climate change or the practical steps they can take to reduce its impact.

This highlights the need for practical education. Karakoram International University (KIU) in Gilgit-Baltistan has a Department of Environmental Sciences, and a course on Climate Change was introduced there in 2025, marking a positive step. Alongside academic instruction, however, a portion of available climate funding should also support students’ practical activities, including challenges, internships, and hands-on work that helps them understand climate change and disaster-related issues beyond the classroom.

Building a Youth Network Across Gilgit-Baltistan

Beyond my own department, many people have limited awareness of disaster risks, vulnerable areas, and the meaning of sustainable development for communities facing environmental challenges. There is a genuine need to bring young people together and build awareness among them.

Students at KIU come from many areas, including Gilgit, Hunza, Nagar, and other remote and vulnerable regions. Connecting these students through a shared network could create a strong youth community. Because they remain connected to their home communities, they could play an important role in spreading awareness locally.

Some students have never personally experienced a major disaster. Such students should be taken on visits to vulnerable areas so they can see how disasters affect people, livelihoods, and communities. We cannot stop natural hazards from occurring, but through awareness, preparedness, and practical solutions, we can reduce their impact.

Environmental funding, therefore, should not be used only for conferences. It should also support practical challenges, internships, and field activities for students. This would offer two important benefits: students would gain real-world experience, while also helping build awareness and community networks in their home areas. These networks could later support disaster preparedness and community response when an alert is issued.

Students also have their own financial needs. Student life is not easy, and meeting educational and living expenses can be difficult. Providing stipends for internships would likely encourage greater participation, allowing students to gain practical experience while easing some of their financial burden.

Recommendations

Based on these observations, I offer the following recommendations:

• Organise field activities: Conduct activities in areas affected by waste and environmental degradation. Awareness campaigns should engage local communities and visitors, explaining how natural places can be protected.
• Collect reliable data: Gather proper data about affected areas to identify environmental problems and develop practical solutions.
• Enforce environmental rules fairly: Establish clear rules against littering and damaging the natural environment. These rules should apply equally to everyone, including students, government employees, and other visitors.
• Introduce fines for violations: Environmental violations should carry appropriate fines or penalties. The funds collected should be reinvested in environmental protection so that money collected because of environmental harm can help restore and protect affected areas.

Conclusion

Climate change and environmental challenges require more than awareness; they demand practical action. By providing students with field experience, practical activities, and opportunities to work with communities, we can encourage meaningful environmental action and improve preparedness for local challenges.

Young people in Gilgit-Baltistan have the potential to become active contributors to climate resilience. With appropriate training, financial support, and opportunities to participate in local initiatives, they can help bridge the gap between classroom learning and community needs. Investing in youth-led environmental action is an important step towards building safer, more aware, and more resilient communities.

Acknowledgements

I would like to acknowledge the people who contributed to the development and refinement of this article. I am grateful to my father for sharing his thoughts and guidance and to Miss Rabia Masood for her helpful guidance and discussion. I am also thankful to Dr Haibat Ali, Head of the Department, for his guidance and valuable input.

I would especially like to thank Dr Karamat Ali for reviewing the article, helping me refine it, and suggesting the title, “Youth for Climate and Environmental Action: Local Problems, Local Solutions and Local Engagement.” Their guidance helped me organise and further develop my observations and ideas.

Ayesha Sabir is a Climate Change student at Karakoram International University. Her interests include climate change, environmental protection, disaster risk reduction, and community-based climate action, with a particular focus on the environmental challenges facing Gilgit-Baltistan.