Climate Congress: What’s on the LUMS Community’s Minds?

With the smog settling in, the LUMS community is masking up! As students, staff and faculty attended the Lahore Biennale’s Climate Congress sessions at LUMS, we caught up with them to hear their thoughts, concerns, and hopes for the future.

We can install air purifiers at the university, but what about people who can’t afford them? Or what about the rest of the city? What’s going to happen after one or two years? Are we going to go around carrying oxygen cylinders? It’s really getting out of hand.
As individuals, I think we need to avoid going out unnecessarily. We should also use public transport and make an effort to carpool.

Zartashia Khan
BA Comparative Literature and Creative Arts ‘26

Why aren’t more people wearing masks?!
Dr. Ali Raza (left)
Associate Professor, LUMS

This smog crisis requires engaging with policymakers who can do something about it - that connection need to be made.
Dr. Ali Usman Qasmi (right)
Director, Gurmani Centre for Languages and Literature
Associate Professor, LUMS

Reading the climate pledges got me thinking that I try to recycle plastic whenever I can, but it’s not always practical. In Lahore, we see the impact when roads flood because plastic clogs the sewage system. Beverage companies are producing massive amounts of plastic daily—it’s their responsibility to clean up the city too.

Ahsan Murtaza
Multimedia Content Associate
Rausing Executive Development Centre, LUMS

I’m thinking about my grandparent’s generation, my grandmother in particular, who never wasted anything—she’d turn old fabrics into quilts. She would collect paper for the house help so they could sell them to make extra money. These indigenous practices of reusing and recycling have been lost to commercialisation and urbanisation. I’m pledging to bring more of that back into my life.

Ahmed Adeen Mirza
BS Anthropology ‘25