ISLAMABAD – Smog has soared to alarming level in Lahore today (Thursday)posing threat to public health thus forcing authorities to close theschools.
Punjab Chief Minister Usman Buzdar, late on Wednesday night, announced theclosure of all public and private schools in provincial capital on(Thursday) after the Air Quality Index soared to over 500 in parts of thecity.
Further, the people have been advised that so long as smog persists, theelderly, children and the infirm should stay indoors with their windowsclosed.Doctors also say that people who feel the affects of smog should drinkplenty of water and wear face masks if they have to travel outside.
It is pertinent to mention here that every year, with the arrival of winterseason, chemical smoke after mixing with fog, forms a thick cloak of fog,hovering over the roads and everywhere, from dawn to dusk, causing threatto public health due to toxic gases also hindering visibility.
Smog, which routinely engulfs Lahore and several other cities of thecountry from November to December, also disrupts airflow and trafficmovement on the roads; leading to economic damage and disruptions intransport logistics causing billions of loss to national exchequer.
According to World Health Organization (WHO) report in 2015, an estimated60,000 Pakistanis died due to higher levels of toxic, Particulate Matter(PM2.5), which was directly associated with environmental disorders.
The WHO in its report had further revealed that during foggy season, levelsof dangerous Particulates Matter (PM2.5), are enough to penetrate deep intothe lungs and enter the bloodstream, which damages human health by reaching1,077 micrograms per cubic meter, (more than 30 times what internationalhealth experts consider the safe limit).
Talking to APP, Dr Tehsin Riaz, a noted physician said that smog causesitchy-eyes and sore-throat which were teh symptoms of smog. He said thatthere was clear evidence that polluted air causes depression andAlzheimer’s disease, an irreversible brain disorder that slowly destroysmemory and thinking skills and harms the ability to carry out the dailyroutine tasks.
The Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission (SUPARCO) in its recentreport said that Pakistan Meteorological Department (PMD) stations did notprovide sufficient information during the smog season, adding they couldonly provide reading of fog-points’ measurement, and itsobservations.Suggesting remedy, the report suggested that continuousmonitoring and spatially coherent picture of smog distribution was possiblethrough the use of satellite observations.
A senior official in SUPARCO said that space study reports and satellitedata of atmospheric pollutants were being used across the globe to overcomesmog issues by making decisions in environmental management activities.
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Misbah-ul-Haq Khan Lodhi, Director Punjab Environmental ProtectionDepartment said that Punjab Government ahead of November, 2019, had decidedto close conventional kilns in consultation with the Smog Commission, whichhad been tasked to identify the root causes of fog generation, and toformulate a policy by prescribing a plan to protect the health of people.
The International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development(ICIMOD)scientists’ study report conducted during 2014-2015, had revealed that massconcentration of PM10 at all sampling sites within Lahore city exceeded theNational Environmental Quality Standards (NEQS) levels during the readingperiods.
The objective of this study was to determine the spatial distribution ofaerosols, their types, and to identify the aerosol origins during specialweather conditions like smog in Pakistan.Punjab Provincial Minister forEnvironment Protection, Bao Muhammad Rizwan said that the Punjab governmenthas taken several emergency measures to counter smog, including a strictban on burning crops and solid waste.
He said that last year more than 100 people were arrested for crop burningand during the current year hundreds of factories have been shut down fornot having proper emission-control equipments.The officials of Lahore Traffic Police department said that they havecollected more than $50,000 in fines in recent days from drivers whosevehicles did not meet with emissions standards, adding Punjab governmenthave set up two centres for checking commercial vehicles for compliance ofenvironmental rules.
Noted environmentalists said, “We have urged the Punjab government to takereal solution and concrete measures to improve fuel quality, introducesolar and other renewable energy resources, phase out fuel-guzzlingvehicles, devise policy for massive tree plantation and improve publictransportation to reduce the number of vehicles on the much busyroads.”Although smoke from crop burning in India is a major reason of smog,but we should formulate our own mechanism to reduce this crisis,environmentalist Mehmood Khalid Qamar said.
On the request of the Punjab government, the Food and AgricultureOrganization of the United Nations (FAO) under its project R-SMOG (RemoteSensing for Spatio-Temporal Mapping of Smog) has prepared a report on smogfor the country.According to the FAO report, the contribution of theagriculture sector in smog generation, through crops residue burning, wasthe third sector of air pollutant emissions.The report calculated thepercentage shares of different sectors in generating smog which contribute45 percent of transport sector, 27 percent of industrial sector and almost20 percent from agriculture.Satellite data of atmospheric pollutants werebeing widely used globally in the decision-making and environmentalmanagement activities of public, private sector and non-profitorganizations, it further said.
Following the FAO report, the Punjab government has took up policy anddecision making, and recommended the establishment of smog monitoring andearly-warning systems. The Punjab government has started adopting therecommendations of FAO report, which need to support farmers adoptmechanized farming and adopt climate smart practices to avoid losses due tosmog and help increase crop yields.
