HYDERABAD: The city is dire need of an improvement in infrastructure to handle the onslaught of climate change, according to experts. Pointing out the possibility of a crisis in the near future, they said that a lacunae in policy is one among many factors that will affect disaster response. “Climate change manifests itself both in acute shocks and chronic stress,” said Administrative Staff College of India’s Centre for Urban Governance director, Srinivasa Chary.
Speaking at an international conference on ‘Climate Change and Disasters: Challenges, Opportunities and Responses’, Chary pointed out that many parts in the city receive water only once in two days. “Resilience to vagaries is high but ‘Day-0’ is a 365-day reality,” he said.

Experts at the conference spoke on the increasing intensity and frequency of disasters such as water scarcity, flooding, changing wind patterns and heatwaves.
Speaking on the lack of infrastructural readiness, Chary said that most new-generation buildings do not have adequate disaster response mechanism and even cranes would find it difficult to reach them. He said that urban areas were far less-prepared for a disaster than the state’s rural parts.
Stating the need for climate-resilient structures on a large-scale, Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), India’s natural resource management director Rajeev Ahal said: “None of the buildings (in Telangana) have any mitigation mechanism for winds.” Ahal also pointed out that even areas with endemic drought were bearing the brunt of floods.
The conference was hosted by the National Institute of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj (NIRDPR) in collaboration with the Indian Society for Ecological Economics (INSEE), Centre for Economic and Social Sciences (CESS), Hyderabad, and GIZ, India.