Senate Body Perturbed Over Massive Import Of Hazardous Waste

ISLAMABAD, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 30th Jun, 2022 ) :The members of the Senate Standing Committee on Climate Change Thursday expressed their resentment over massive import of hazardous waste onshore through unsafe practices leaving public health and ecology in jeopardy.

The Senate Committee meeting was held under the chairmanship of Senator Seemee Ezdi who appreciated the National Hazardous Waste Management Policy drafted by the Ministry of Climate Change which was approved by the Federal cabinet after a prolonged period.

The chair recommended on behalf of the committee to provide adequate resources to the Ministry to ensure capacity beef up for better implementation of the policy.

Minister for Climate Change Senator Sherry Rehman said it was a milestone policy and a long due legislation.

However, the provinces were the obvious partners to implement it which was a challenge as nothing could be done without provinces.

She suggested that there should be penalities on the origin of hazardous waste allowing such cargo without confirming safe transport mechanisms on the other side.

All provinces have agreed in principle to implement the legislation which was part of the GSP Plus implementation, she said, adding, China has shut the import of hazardous waste and due to which, it had increased in Pakistan as no objection certificates (NOCs) were being issued to the recycling industry.

"This system is in many south Asian countries which must be regulated and classified to ensure safe management of toxic waste for reuse processes," she added.

The minister argued that it was not the job of the MoCC to give NOC while it had no port being regulated under its ambit and this power, thus should be given to the provinces.

She underlined that the MoCC in the previous government issued 40 NOCs in the previous regime to the recycling industry.

"We have no climate finance network or tax net whereas it will take a year to make climate finance and tax policy which does not exist at the moment".

Sherry highlighted Pakistan's 9.1% GDP was damaged due to climate change and emerged as most of the economically and financially impacted due to climate change.

Senator Mohammad Humayun Mohmand showered praise on the MoCC officials for working out a comprehensive and most apt policy document to address the long neglected of toxic waste.

"Nothing can be done without a strong implementation arm. The federal government should persecute the provinces and there should be some penalty to discourage proliferation of toxic material in the environment," he added.

The Ministry's Joint Secretary International Convention Syed Mujtaba briefed the body over the imperatives of the policy, its consultation process and implementation plan.

Syed Mujtaba informed that the policy was also a necessary requirement for the next round of GSP plus compliance round to take place in the coming months.

The Joint Secretary also stated the comprehensive definition of hazardous waste derived from the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act (PEPA) 1997.

The hazardous waste included electronic waste, waste oil, hospital waste and plastic waste.

"As per UN University Bonn, some 954,000 tonnes of electronic waste has been imported by Pakistan from various countries annually. However, the Ministry's own report found that 30 million tonnes of municipal solid waste (MSW) has been generated in Pakistan and 10-14% of which includes hazardous waste," Mujtaba told the Committee.

In 2019, 624 containers were dumped in Pakistan filled with hazardous waste which were discarded by the custom authorities in a conventional unsafe procedure.

However, the importer of that waste went into hiding after the containers were seized, he added.

"The policy will take into account the local and imported hazardous waste quantities, procedure and management parameters adopted by the importers. The hazardous waste or material is imported after prior consent of the exporting countries' relevant ministry.We are introducing stringent measures to take into account the states allowing unchecked transboundary transport of toxic waste".

A National action plan would developed with all provincial, public and private stakeholders on board along with a National Implementation Committee only comprising of experts and no journalist would be its member, he informed.

Senator Faisal Javed said the imported toxic waste was not acceptable and improvement in the legislation was necessary.

Director General Pakistan Environmental Protection Agency (Pak-EPA) Farzana Altaf Shah said over 60 cases were under trail in the Environmental Protection Tribunal related to hazardous management.

Senator Taj Haider suggested the ministry to workout policies to ensure shift of energy mix over renewables.

IG Forest MoCC Ghulam Qadir Shah briefed the measures taken by the Ministry on immediate response measures to take local community on board and mobilise all available resources with other departments for controlling forest fires.

Senator Irfan-ul-Haque Siddiqui moved the agenda point related to tree cutting in the premises of Radio Pakistan buildings in Rawalpindi.

The trees in Radio Pakistan building Islamabad, Peshawar Lahore and all over Pakistan were the property of federal government which should be preserved rather than felled without any precaution.

The standing committee on information formed a committee whose inquiry report of 144 pages revealed that 250 trees were cut in Peshawar and the forum needed to take note of it.

"The committee has to determine who had allowed cutting trees at 21 stations of Radio Pakistan in the country. Let's wait for the committee report to be completed."The chair deferred the agenda item with the consent of the mover till receiving the committee report.