Demography and global warming

Lawmakers show that they are facing pressure

Legislators generally only show an interest in a subject if their voters do. Broadminded legislators do so if enough of their constituents do, whether voters or not. Therefore, if MNAs are taking an interest in the demographic dividend and climate change, it is not because there is any intrinsic connection between the two, or because either is a personal hobbyhorse, but because they are facing pressure on these subjects. If the growing population means that there is a trifecta of demands, for jobs, for schools, for medicare, climate change means that legislators face more farmers worried about water shortages and changed cropping patterns. This wpi;d show the interest shown by MNAs and Senators at a discussion to discuss the budget 2026-2027 in the light of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals in Islamabad, convened by PML(N) MNA Shaista Parvez Malik.

There is a long history of a growing population being called a population explosion, and now that same population growth is being called a demographic dividend by Western commentators who have an aging population at home, and look with envy at the young population in the Third World, only they say, apparently quite reasonably, that these young people need education so that they can compete in the workplace of tomorrow. There are two underlying purposes. First, to prevent these young people from flooding the West as illegal migrants. Second, if they do make it to the West, they are equipped with useful economic skills. Our lawmakers are faced with a budget that does not do enough to provide that supposed dividend with either education or jobs, and medicare.

The other subject which is getting legislators uneasy is climate change. Constituencies deep inland will not know the problem coastal populations are having to adapt to, that of rising sea levels (as polar ice caps and glaciers melt), but they will be affected when those populations start migrating, strain on already inadequate housing, education, medicare and other resources. Rural areas, to which most of our legislators belong, are also witnessing both extreme weather events such as floods and droughts, and experiencing distortions in the ecological balance which have caused such disasters as the recent locust invasion. Another sign of climate change is the invasion of microbes which once could not survive in this part of the world, such as dengue. The government ignores such discussions at its peril, for it must realize that legislators express the concerns of people, and unless they are met, trouble will follow.