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500mgd of pollutants being released into the sea daily

By our correspondents
May 27, 2016

‘Pakistan Navy suffering heavily due to marine pollution’

Karachi: Deterioration of Pakistan Navy’s ships and submarines has doubled due to alarming levels of marine pollution off the coast of Karachi as around 500 million gallons of untreated polluted water, containing both industrial waste and sewage, is being poured into the sea every day, the Senate’s Standing Committee on Environment observed on Thursday.

Talking to journalists, the chairman of the Senate’s Standing Committee on Environment, Mir Muhammad Yousaf Badini, said it was a shock for the committee to know that 500 million gallons of waste water was being released into the sea on daily basis.

“The rate of wear and tear of Pakistan Navy’s assets, including their ships, submarines and boats, has been doubled due to increasing marine pollution.” 

Accompanied by Senator Ahmed Hasan from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Senator Nuzhat Sadiq, Senator Saleem Zia and Federal Secretary Climate Change Syed Abu Ahmed Akif visited various areas where industrial waste and sewage was being poured into the sea, attended a briefing of the Pakistan Navy on effects of marine pollution, and also inspected mangrove plantation drive by a private fertiliser firm on 50 hectares in the coastal belt of Karachi.

Senator Badini said marine pollution had become an international issue and due to disastrous effects of climate change, it was the responsibility of every Pakistani to play his role in reducing different kinds of pollution to save the environment.

Regarding the Pakistan Navy officials, he said the force was paying a heavy price due to increasing sea pollution and millions of rupees were being additionally spent on the maintenance of national assets, which was not affordable for a country like Pakistan.

“Industrial effluent, tanneries’ waste, dung of thousands of buffalos and solid waste is being dumped into the sea without any treatment, which is unacceptable”, he said. Similarly, marine ecosystems, natural habitats and Mangroves were being destroyed due to environmental pollution as well as cutting of Mangrove trees by the land Mafia, Senator Badini said and urged the provincial government to eliminate the grabbers, who were encroaching upon land along the coastal areas by destroying Mangroves. Badini said members of the Senate body were appalled by the extremely dismal state of coastal areas, which had become highly contaminated due to the fact that mangroves forests were being destroyed in coastal areas around Karachi by land mafia for cattle grazing and fuel-wood purposes.

“The Sindh Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) and relevant government authorities must play their part to protect and conserve natural resources in the coastal areas,” he urged.

To a query, he vowed to work with the provincial governments of Sindh and Balochistan to device a mechanism and initiate policy measures for protecting coastal and marine ecosystems.

The Senate Committee’s member and PML-N leader, Senator Nuzhat Sadiq, called for setting up treatment plants in industrial zones and on sewage drains from where the highly contaminated industrial effluents and domestic sewage was passed into the sea.