Top 5 pollution problems of Pakistan

Pakistan means the land of pure but actually it is one those countries that are almost fail to combat their pollution problems. Either it is land pollution, water pollution, air pollution or any other of similar kind; not only it is worsening day by day but also no one is to control it because of the ineffective pollution control mechanism. The end result is that people are suffering from various diseases owing to unbridled environmental degradation across the country.

Mainly Pakistanis are suffering from five types of pollutions. These are:

Land Pollution in Pakistan

This is one of the worst pollution problems in the county that has brutally hit the soil fertility and its other features. The main causes of this type of environmental decay are following:

• Mismanagement of solid waste
• Unsafe disposal of chemical and hazardous waste
• No proper mechanism to dispose of hospitals’ infectious waste

Main reason of rising level of land pollution in Pakistan is lethargy of government departments and civic agencies to address this issue with environmentally viable methods. Moreover, environmental care and protection has always been at the backburner in policy-making domain since independence. As a result government tries to resolve each environmental issue without any proper policy and that is why unable to make any success to control the land pollution in this land of pure.

Industrial Pollution in Pakistan

Despite of a proper environmental protection laws – Pakistan Environmental Protection Act 1997 – industrial pollution knows no bound in the country. There are four main causes of this menace:

• Industrial effluent – that is a thick leftover in liquid which is produced as a result of the manufacturing process
• Industrial wastewater – when water used in industrial process it becomes wastewater
• Industrial emissions – this is smoke coming out from the chimney of the factory as a result of fuel burning in machines
• Industrial noise – that is noise beyond tolerable limits which comes out from the machines

The cause of failure in industrial pollution control is lack of a powerful mechanism to implement the environmental laws in the country. The organizations responsible to put this law into practice lack efficiency and capability to accomplish this task because of what they claim as shortage of funds and manpower.

Water Pollution in Pakistan

Diseases due to water pollution in Pakistan are rising at an alarming rate. There is no data available to refer here but it is widely said that out of each five deaths in the country two are because of various water-borne diseases. Green laws of the country also have provisions to control this kind of pollution but again the weak implementation structure fails to accomplish this task. Apart from industrial effluent and wastewater; agriculture run off and civic wastewater are two important causes of water pollution in Pakistan.

Vehicular Pollution in Pakistan

There is no any environmental monitoring in Pakistan for the vehicles plying on the roads. A vehicle owner easily gets the fitness certificate of his vehicle from the Police Department and plies it on roads emitting smoke beyond the limits set by National Environmental Quality Standards. Interestingly there are no subsidiary rules to support the Section 15 of the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act 1997 that envisages to control vehicular pollution in Pakistan. In the absence of such rules traffic police can fine the polluting vehicle a meager amount of Rs200. Owner of the polluting vehicle laughingly pays this petty sum and keeps polluting the natural environment of the country.

Agriculture Pollution in Pakistan

More than 70 per cent population of the country still lives in rural areas despite growing trend of urbanization. In rural areas the following two activities are increasing the level of agriculture pollution:

• Excessive use of chemical fertilizers for increased crop production
• Unsafe use of pesticides to control the attack of pest on crops

As a result crops are producing polluted grain, fruits and vegetables that are directly affecting the health of their consumers.

Conclusion

To resolve these top 5 pollution problems of Pakistan it is necessary to effectively implement the environmental laws and prosecute the polluter without any leniency. Simultaneously people should be made aware to play their role for the mitigation of these problems.