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Things are not quite the same in the developing world, which includes Pakistan, a country that for 63 years of its life has made efforts in the development field without any startling success and as far as the environment is concerned has never been unduly worried. It remains unworried largely because its leadership is continually involved in hanging on to what power it possesses. The Pakistani military mind is not taught to be geared to environmental problems and in most cases the civilian mind is unable to grasp the significance or the importance of anything to do with environmental protection.
Amazing though it may seem we do have a body known as the Pakistan Environmental Protection Council (PEPC), which was formed in 1984 under Section 3 of the Pakistan Environmental Protection Ordinance 1983. It was set to meet twice a year under the chairmanship of the president but a later amendment in the ordinance provided for the prime minister to head the PEPC.
During the first nine years of its existence it met once — amply illustrating the importance attached to it by the military mind over a period of four years and by the civilian mind over a period of five years. The first meeting of the PEPC was held on May 10, 1993 headed by the then caretaker prime minister, Balakh Sher Mazari, who established the National Environmental Quality Standards relating to municipal and liquid industrial effluent, industrial gaseous emissions and motor vehicle exhaust and noise — an exercise in futility judging by what confronts us today.
In the second of the Benazir Bhutto governments the matter of the national environment was handed over to the prime minister's husband, our present accidental president, who was appointed chairman of the PEPC. We do not know the motives behind this appointment but they must have been other than mere altruism. However, whatever were the motives, seven meetings of the PEPC were held between 1994 and 1996. What good they did and to whom and how was and is not evident.
The following Nawaz Sharif regime held two meetings, in 1997 and 1999. Now, to give credit to the present prime minister, Yousuf Raza Gilani — in the midst of the turmoil surrounding the 18th constitutional amendment, the tussle with the judiciary, and the militants spread around the country — he found time on March 29 to hold and chair the 11th meeting of the PEPC. According to a report in this newspaper on April 5, what was circulated at the meeting was but 'bad news.' The participants apparently learnt that the air they breathe is more poisonous than ever, that water in every stream or river is unsafe for human consumption, that garbage ends up in our streets, that lakes and forests are receding, and that combating climate change is nowhere on the government's agenda.
A report presented inter alia advised the PM and his companions that the ambient air quality of Pakistan has fallen way below the World Health Organisation standards of 35 micrograms per cubic meter, that total dissolved solids are also way above WHO standards — i.e. 3,000 tons of waste is dumped in the streets of Karachi, 2,000 in Lahore. Of this waste some 40 per cent is infectious hospital waste, incinerators not being considered necessary.
Despite the reported concern of the PEPC in the years 1994-96 when the goal was set to increase forest cover over the land from the existing five per cent to 10 per cent by the planting of some 300 million saplings (government website) natural forests are on the decrease by over three per cent per year. The present cost of environmental degradation is Rs365bn per year.
What measures this government intends to take have not been disclosed to us, and, with its performance and record when it comes to the neglect of the people at large, it being too involved with its own survival and individual benefits, we would be foolish to think that it has the health and wealth of future generations and of an exploding population in mind. The majority of our dear legislators, being heavily endowed with worldly wealth as they are undoubtedly, do not dwell too much on the future of this country and its environment as they have alternative homes in far greener pastures than ours. However, and notwithstanding, it would be good to know from the ministry of the environment exactly what schemes it has in the pipeline that may give us good rather than bad news.
To repeat the words of UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon who, in September 2009, on his return from a visit to the Arctic to witness the changes wrought by global warming, told an environmental conference in Geneva that “Our foot is stuck on the accelerator and we are heading towards an abyss.” In our context, this is highly apt.
Afterthought In the matter of the mental health environment of the people of Pakistan, Prime Minister Gilani must be given credit for having, with eminent sense, reversed the government decision to move into daylight saving time as of the first of this month. Advancing the clocks by one hour serves absolutely no purpose but to disturb the lives of the many millions of this country. It has not been proven in any way or by anyone that it saves one iota of power, nor does it at all mitigate the load-shedding to which we are relentlessly subjected. We must hope that this harebrained idea has been shelved once and for all.
