Kuwait signs MoU with UN-Habitat

Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR) signed an agreement with the UN Human Settlements Program (UN-Habitat) to combat dust storms

Kuwait, The Gulf Observer: Kuwait Institute for Scientific Research (KISR) signed an agreement with the UN Human Settlements Program (UN-Habitat) to finance the adaptation and resilience project for cross-border sand and dust storms coming from southern Iraq and address the dust problem affecting Kuwait and Gulf states. KISR’s Director General Dr Manea Al-Sudairawi said in a statement that the project will be implemented in two areas in the south of Iraqi territory, with an area of 8,212 sq km, as they are major sources of dust storms.

Both regions were identified after scientific studies carried out by KISR were published in scientific journals, through which the locations and number of dust storms that reach Kuwait from 2020 until the end of 2022 were determined, Sudairawi added. The project aims to identify the causes of sand and dust storms from the climatic and geological aspects, protect and increase the skills of adaptation and resilience in storm areas and absorb their negative effects in order to reduce their occurrence, while achieving a set of sustainable development goals and produce measurement mechanisms and indicators to mitigate the effects of storms, he said.

Annual losses resulting from sand and dust storms were estimated at KD 190 million, while the project, which will be implemented through the UN program at a value of KD 4 million, will target specific areas located 250 km north of the Kuwaiti border, Dr Sudairawi mentioned. He referred to the direct impact of those areas, which amounts to 40 percent of the total storms that Kuwait, southern Iraq and the eastern region of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Bahrain and parts of UAE are exposed to.