City Desk :
Environmental experts have stressed the need for effective measures to protect Dhaka city dwellers from air pollution during the winter when it usually turns unhealthy and hazardous.
They suggest sweeping the city’s roads with water regularly, covering construction sites and materials, and stopping the movement of overloaded and unfit motor vehicles in the city, reports UNB.
The experts blame the authorities concerned for their lack of seriousness as no visible steps are seen yet to improve the air quality, which worsens terribly from November to February.
Ainun Nishat, Professor Emeritus at the Centre for Climate Change and Environmental Research of BRAC University, says dust particles from construction sites, earth filing and roads, black smoke from overloaded motor vehicles and traditional brick kilns located around Dhaka are largely responsible for the unhealthy air quality at the time.
Noting that traditional brick kilns are the major sources of air pollution, he advises the government to announce the brick manufactures as an industry in order to compel the traditional brick kilns to take environmental clearance.
“If we declare the brick kilns as an industrial enterprise, they will have to take environmental clearance. If so, traditional brick kilns can’t go in operation in case of harming the environment,” Prof Nishat tells UNB. He said water should be sprayed on the Dhaka roads every day during the dry season to control air pollution. “The air pollution is there in almost every country and they’ve effort to minimize it. But we don’t have any effort to control it in our country,” he adds. Prof Nishat says old motor vehicles having low efficiency burn huge petrol, which is also a major source of air pollution. So, the movement of such vehicles needs to be controlled, if we want to improve the air quality.
