Research Fellow at PIVRA
Sobia Arooj is a climate policy and sustainable development researcher holding an MPhil in International Development Studies, specializing in sustainable development governance and South-South cooperation frameworks. She holds ESG reporting certifications (CSRD, ISSB, TCFD, GRI) and a certification in SDG-Aligned Finance from UNITAR. She currently serves as a Research Fellow at PIVRA.
Pakistan has ESG guidelines and green finance standards but no national ESG law and no single responsible body. Weighs where speakers at the Pakistan ESG Policy Report launch agreed and disagreed, and sets out a four-stage path: a gap analysis, soft law through existing regulators, a coordinating ESG body, and then a proper law with audit rules, incentives and fair penalties.
Pakistan needs roughly $60 billion a year to stay on track for the SDGs, while debt servicing now consumes more than half the federal budget. Sets out five recommendations, debt-for-development swaps, sovereign green sukuk, ESG disclosure, digital tax enforcement, and SDG-aligned CPEC 2.0 financing, addressed to specific institutional actors.
Assesses the Pakistan Stock Exchange's new homegrown ESG benchmark index, its methodology, and the self-reported disclosure gap that will decide whether it can be trusted as regulation begins to depend on it.
Examines the bind facing exporters, carbon markets, and commodity supply chains across South Asia, Africa, and Latin America under ESG frameworks (ISSB, CSRD, GRI, TCFD, SASB) written without their participation, and asks whether the answer is regional co-authorship of standards.
