NOIDA: As the scorching sun beat down on his fruit cart, Mohammad Ikrar dreaded another day of tossing out dozens of rotting mangoes and melons - a regular practice now as India grapples with an unprecedented heatwave.
The 38-year-old does not own a refrigerator, meaning hisfruit quickly spoils. By the end of the day, any leftoverproduce is usually only good to be fed to passing stray cows.
Since April, Ikrar said he has lost up to 3,000 rupees ($39)a week - nearly half of his average weekly earnings.
“This heat is torturous. But if I want to buy an AC (airconditioner) or fridge one day, I have to do this,” said Ikrar,wearing a full sleeve shirt and white headwrap to keep cool inthe 44 degrees Celsius (111.2F) heat.
At home, Ikrar and his family suffer hours-long power cutsday and night, rendering the ceiling fan useless in theirone-room house in Noida, a satellite city of New Delhi.
He sends all three of his children to a school fitted withair coolers for “respite” from the heat.
“I sweat all day, then sweat all night. There is no way toproperly cool off. I haven’t experienced anything like thissince I moved here eight years ago,” he said.
Ikrar provides a snapshot of the threat Indians face from alack of access to cooling amid widespread blackouts.
Almost 323 million people across the country are at highrisk from extreme heat and a lack of cooling mechanisms such asfans and refrigerators, found a report https://www.seforall.org/chilling-prospects-2022released on Tuesday by Sustainable Energy for All (SE4ALL), aU.N.-backed organisation.
India topped a list of “critical” countries, also includingChina, Indonesia, and Pakistan, which have the largestpopulations facing heat-related dangers ranging from immediateoverheating deaths to impacts on food security and livelihoods.
Temperatures in the New Delhi area soared above 49C (120F)in some regions last week after India recorded its hottest Marchhttps://www.reuters.com/world/india/poor-workers-bear-brunt-indias-heatwave-2022-05-16in 122 years and an unusually hot April.
Temperatures are expected to cool https://city.imd.gov.in/citywx/localwx.phpas monsoon rains arrive in June.
‘WORRYING URBAN TRENDS’
India’s electricity demand has hit a record high with asurge in the use of air conditioning triggering the worst powercrisis https://www.reuters.com/world/india/why-is-india-facing-its-worst-power-crisis-over-six-years-2022-05-19in more than six years.
But, like Ikrar, not everyone can beat the heat.
Although nearly all households in India have access toelectricity, only a fraction of its 1.4 billion population ownsany cooling appliances, found SE4ALL.
As demand for cooling appliances will soar in coming years,it will also add pressure to India’s overstretched electricitysystems and lead to a potential increase in emissions, saidBrian Dean, head of energy efficiency and cooling at SE4ALL.
“(This) in turn further exacerbates the risk of longer andmore extreme heatwaves,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
He urged authorities to quickly implement the India CoolingAction Plan http://ozonecell.nic.in/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/INDIA-COOLING-ACTION-PLAN-e-circulation-version080319.pdf,launched in 2019, which aims to cut cooling demands by up to25% by 2038 through measures including developing new coolingtechnology and designing buildings with natural airflow.
Scientists have linked the early onset of an intense summerto climate change, and say more than a billion people in Indiaand neighbouring Pakistan https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/pakistan-india-reel-under-intense-heat-wave-2022-04-29are in some way at risk from the extreme heat.
SE4ALL found Pakistan’s largest city of Karachi - along withmany others including Mumbai and Dhaka in South Asia - are amongthose most at risk from inadequate cooling.
Farhan Anwar, a Karachi-based urban planning consultant,said the city’s poor were the main victims of extreme heat,likely caused by the so-called “urban heat island effect” inwhich concrete-heavy landscapes push up temperatures.
“Unplanned densification, automobile intensive mobilitychoices and rapidly reducing green cover are worrying urbantrends,” Anwar said, calling for action to boost green spaces.
ACTION NEEDED
In India, government data shows at least 25 people have diedfrom heat stroke since late March, the highest toll in the pastfive years.
The official number is just “the tip of the iceberg”, saidDileep Mavalankar, head of the Indian Institute of PublicHealth, a private university in Gandhinagar in the western stateof Gujarat.
Heat is a largely invisible killer which can be hard topinpoint as a cause of death, he said, especially as it oftenaffects elderly and unwell people and can be caused by indirectexposure such as being trapped in small, poorly ventilatedhomes.
Such indirect exposure cases make up about nine in 10 heatdeaths, he said, with India likely counting only about 10% ofthe true total.
Mavalankar helped implement South Asia’s first Heat ActionPlan https://www.nrdc.org/sites/default/files/ahmedabad-heat-action-plan-2018.pdf(HAP) in Ahmedabad in Gujarat in 2013, after the city saw morethan 1,300 deaths in a 2010 heatwave. He credited the HAP forsaving up to 1,200 deaths every summer.
The HAP, which includes early warning text messages tomobile phones, has expanded https://public.wmo.int/en/media/news/successive-heatwaves-india-and-pakistan-highlight-role-of-early-warningsto nearly two dozen heatwave-prone states and more than 130cities and districts.
The plan also directs people to seek respite from heatwavesin “cooling centres” such as air-conditioned public buildings,shops and malls, temples, and parks. For some, they can belife-saving.
Mavalankar and SE4ALL’s Dean both called for the broader useof “cool roofs” with reflective surfaces or coatings to reducetemperatures in low-income and informal housing.
From building heat-resistant homes to creating more greenspaces, Mavalankar said prompt action is needed to help the poorand vulnerable survive a hotter world https://news.trust.org/item/20220510064254-s7j8o.
“Temperatures may increase by three to five degrees incoming summers,” he warned.
“We have to prepare right now.”
