Daily Times

Following Earth Day 2018, which was marked yesterday (April 22) across the globe, it is important for people everywhere, regardless of nationality, to consider the impact humanity has had on this planet. The purpose of Earth Day is to create awareness that environmental pollution can be brought on the national agenda in all countries. As such, Daily Times commends Punjab Chief Minister (CM) Shahbaz Sharif for being the only CM to have made a statement regarding the importance of protecting the environment yesterday. However, we would also point out the impact on air quality that his development projects in Lahore have had.

Regardless, the theme for this Earth Day was not air pollution, but ending plastic pollution. It can take millennia for plastics to decompose. Consequently, they have accumulated in the earth’s soil and water bodies at an alarming rate. Entire islands have been discovered in our oceans that are entirely made up of trash.

This is an issue Pakistanis should be able to relate to. Widespread use of plastic bags has decimated our cities’ sewerage systems and created piles of non-biodegradable trash that are not only eyesores, but also health hazards.

In February 2018, Minister for Climate Change Mushahidullah Khan told the Senate that as many as 55 billion shopping bags are used in Pakistan annually, and that their use is increasing at a rate of 15 percent per annum. Quoting a PEPA national survey, he said that 160,000 persons are directly and 600,000 persons were indirectly dependent on the industry.

The strategy provincial governments in Pakistan have used against such bags has been to ban them. Most recently, the Sindh government banned the production and use of plastic bags on March 21, 2018. However, such bans have already failed in both Balochistan and capital territory. This is not surprising, given the large number of people dependent on this industry and the exponentially larger number of people who use its product.

Bans fail when the item being banned has a high demand, especially in settings like Pakistan where law enforcement is weak. Therefore there is an urgent need for the authorities to review their strategy. Nothing can be achieved until an economically viable replacement for plastic bags is introduced to the public. Once this is done, the governments must incentivize its use by offering subsidies to traders and shopkeepers who use the environmentally friendly product, and place higher taxes on plastic bags. An educational campaign must also be run in conjunction with this.

Environmental pollution is a complicated issue, which has no simple solutions. Administrative bans are not enough to rid this country of plastic pollution. The authorities need to come up with out of the box solutions.  *

Published in Daily Times, April 23^rd 2018.