Citizen Air Monitors Fill Pakistan's Data Gap

Founded by engineer Abid Omar, whose first sensor went live in Karachi in October 2016, the Pakistan Air Quality Initiative builds and deploys low-cost PM2.5 monitors and publishes the data openly so residents in one of the world's most polluted countries can see what they're breathing. The initiative helped push Pakistan toward Euro IV fuel standards and sat on the government's Smog Commission advising on mitigation policy. In 2025 the EPIC Air Quality Fund backed PAQI to install 70 more PM2.5 monitors nationwide with Pakistan's National Emergencies Operation Center.