Karachi's Road, Civic Infrastructure To Be Overhauled: Nasir Shah

Karachi's road, civic infrastructure to be overhauled: Nasir Shah

Sindh Minister of Local Government, Syed Nasir Hussain Shah Wednesday announced that road and civic infrastructure of Karachi would be rebuilt and overhauled immediately after end of current monsoon season

KARACHI, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 17th Aug, 2022 ) :Sindh Minister of Local Government, Syed Nasir Hussain Shah Wednesday announced that road and civic infrastructure of Karachi would be rebuilt and overhauled immediately after end of current monsoon season.

He while addressing concluding session of National Waste Management Conference organised by the National Forum for Environment and Health (NFEH) here reiterated Sindh government's resolve to make Karachi clean, green, and a fully developed city.

The minister said that proper waste collection system would be made fully operational in all districts of Karachi in the next few weeks and Sindh Solid Waste Management Board (SSWMB) would made proper arrangements for daily collection and disposal of garbage from the metropolis.

He said that in the next step the SSWMB would unfold its waste disposal system in other major cities of Sindh after resolving the trash issue in Karachi.

Managing-Director SSWMB, Zubair Ahmed Channa, informed that the board was transporting up to 9,000 tones of waste generated in Karachi daily to landfill sites while just a year ago only 3,000 tones of garbage was reaching at those sites for safe disposal.

Before establishment of SSWMB in 2014, Karachi was lacking waste management system for disposal of 11,000 tones of municipal waste and private contractors and scavengers used to collect waste from different neighbour hoods, he said adding that they had not ensured disposal of the waste to Karachi's two proper landfill sites and garbage was thrown at various dumping points nearby residential localities.

He said that owing to improper handling and disposal of trash in Karachi it was utterly difficult to consume municipal waste for useful purposes like waste-to-energy and recycling projects.

The Dean of Architecture and Management Sciences of the NED University of Engineering & Technology, Prof Dr Noman Ahmed, emphasised that hospital waste should be properly segregated before its disposal on a scientific basis.

He said that municipal workers and scavengers in the city were prone to deadly infectious diseases as they handled the hospital waste daily without any safety precautions much like the casual way the municipal garbage is handled in Karachi.

He lamented that there was no check at all to stop scavengers from extracting useful and recyclable material from the hospital trash as this practice should come to an end to safeguard public health.

He said the government should provide maximum resources and support for developing an efficient system of hospital waste disposal as unsafe practices in this regard had gravely compromised public health during the coronavirus pandemic.

Chief Executive Officer TransKarachi, Wasif Ijlal, said the Red Line BRTS project being built in Karachi from Malir Halt to Numaish would generate minimal carbon emissions as it would operate on bio gas to be generated by consuming dung available in Karachi's Cattle Colony.

He said the Red Line BRTS would become operational in the next three years as it would resolve the issue of safe disposal of dung produced in the Cattle Colony that is otherwise unsafely disposed of into the sea.

He said the use of bio gas for the Red Line bus service would minimise its fuel cost as it would become the first BRTS in Pakistan, which would require no subsidy from the government for its operations.

President NFEH Naeem Qureshi said that his non-governmental organisation had hosted the conference to find a lasting solution to the municipal and hazardous waste generated in Karachi for protecting the health of its citizens.