According to the World Bank's latest report, extreme heat is emerging as a structural threat to South Asia's economic growth and employment. Extreme heat is costing South Asia nearly the equivalent of 31 million full-time jobs every year and is on track to reduce the region's economy by nearly 7 percent by 2050, as reported in the World Bank's new report released on Friday. The report, titled A Livable Future: Protecting Jobs and Growth from Extreme Heat in South Asia's Cities, warns that the challenge will intensify as South Asia adds around 280 million working-age people by 2050, most of them in cities. By 2070, around 520 million people across South Asia could experience at least one month of dangerous heat each year, four times as many as today, highlighting the accelerating nature of this climate threat. Johannes Zutt, the World Bank's vice president for South Asia, emphasized that the region's economic future depends heavily on its cities, but rising temperatures are putting jobs, livelihoods and economic growth at risk.
As reported by the World Bank, rising temperatures are placing increasing pressure on power systems and urban infrastructure across South Asia. Electricity demand reached a record 156 billion units in May 2024, up 15 per cent from a year earlier, driven partly by rising cooling needs, while air conditioner sales increased an estimated 34 per cent between 2023 and 2024. The report indicates that temperatures above 40 degrees Celsius increase the frequency of power outages by 20–50 per cent and their duration by 15–60 per cent, undermining electricity supply reliability during peak demand periods. Rising temperatures are also putting growing pressure on health systems and critical infrastructure, while hitting low-income households, informal workers, women, the elderly, and children the hardest. The World Bank notes that several South Asian cities have already introduced measures such as heat action plans, urban greening, heat-resilient infrastructure, early warning systems and energy-efficient cooling technologies, which are producing positive results but require stronger institutions, better coordination and greater investment.
According to the World Bank analysis, heat is expected to raise risks for transport infrastructure and public health across South Asia. The report cited heat-related damage to the Mumbai-Nagpur Expressway and warned that temperatures at Delhi's Indira Gandhi International Airport could approach or exceed 50 degrees Celsius for multiple days each year by 2030, potentially forcing aircraft to reduce passenger or cargo loads during take-off. The report estimated that a single five-day heatwave in India is associated with around 30,000 excess deaths, suggesting the health burden of extreme heat is significantly higher than officially recorded heatstroke fatalities. Extreme heat is already reducing labour productivity, disrupting businesses, and jeopardizing the competitiveness of South Asia's cities. John Warburton, climate resilience lead for the Indo-Pacific regional department at the FCDO, described extreme heat as destroying livelihoods across South Asia while placing greater pressure on public health and reducing productivity, with the most vulnerable communities suffering the greatest losses and being pushed deeper into poverty.
As noted in the World Bank report, for the poorest workers in informal settlements and construction sites, exposure is most acute across South Asia. A 2025 survey of Delhi street vendors found that 90 per cent had cut working hours during the summer because of extreme heat, while 72 per cent reported losses from heat-damaged inventory. The report emphasizes that rising temperatures will increasingly shape where people can work, how productively they can work, and which cities prove attractive for investment, with the urban heat island effect adding yet more heat to already extreme baseline temperatures. Extreme heat is already reducing labour productivity, disrupting businesses, and jeopardizing the competitiveness of South Asia's cities, making it one of the greatest threats to jobs, productivity, and long-term economic growth in the region. The World Bank argues that this represents not only a climate crisis but also a development crisis, making coordinated, long-term action across sectors essential.
The World Bank report estimates that India represents a $1.6 trillion investment opportunity in sustainable cooling by 2040, while a proposed programme to expand domestic manufacturing of affordable cooling equipment could create nearly 3.7 million jobs over the same period. The report recommends investing in heat resilient infrastructure, strengthening heat action plans, protecting vulnerable workers, expanding sustainable cooling, improving early warning systems, and mobilizing public and private investment to build more resilient cities. The report calls for extreme heat to be treated not merely as a seasonal disaster but as a central development challenge, urging governments to integrate heat-risk management into urban planning, infrastructure development, public policy and private investment. A World Bank cost-benefit analysis found that heat early warning systems in Indian cities return roughly $50 for every $1 spent on them, with authorities able to protect residents and keep local economies working through the hottest months of the year. The report was prepared with support from the Resilient Asia Programme, funded under the UK government's Climate Action for a Resilient Asia (CARA) programme of the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO), and received support from the World Bank's Global Facility for Disaster Reduction and Recovery (GFDRR) and the City Resilience Programme (CRP).
