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Pakistan
Index
Little attention was paid to pollution and
environmental
issues in Pakistan until the early 1990s. Related
concerns, such
as sanitation and potable water, received earlier
scrutiny. In
1987 only about 6 percent of rural residents and 51
percent of
urban residents had access to sanitary facilities; in 1990
a
total of 97.6 million Pakistanis, or approximately 80
percent of
the population, had no access to flush toilets. Greater
success
has been achieved in bringing potable water within reach
of the
people; nearly half the population enjoyed such access by
1990.
However, researchers at the Pakistan Medical Research
Council,
recognizing that a large proportion of diseases in
Pakistan are
caused by the consumption of polluted water, have been
questioning the "safe" classification in use in the 1990s.
Even
the 38 percent of the population that receives its water
through
pipelines runs the risk of consuming seriously
contaminated
water, although the problem varies by area. In Punjab, for
example, as much as 90 percent of drinking water comes
from
groundwater, as compared with only 9 percent in Sindh.
The central government's Perspective Plan (1988-2003)
and
previous five-year plans do not mention sustainable
development
strategies
(see Development Planning
, ch. 3). Further,
there have
been no overarching policies focused on sustainable
development
and conservation. The state has focused on achieving selfsufficiency in food production, meeting energy demands,
and
containing the high rate of population growth, not on
curtailing
pollution or other environmental hazards.
In 1992 Pakistan's National Conservation Strategy
Report attempted to redress the previous inattention
to the
nation's mounting environmental problem. Drawing on the
expertise
of more than 3,000 people from a wide array of political
affiliations, the government produced a document outlining
the
current state of environmental health, its sustainable
goals, and
viable program options for the future
(see National Conservation Goals
, this ch.).
Of special concern to environmentalists is the
diminishing
forest cover in watershed regions of the northern
highlands,
which has only recently come under close scrutiny. Forest
areas
have been thoughtlessly denuded. Deforestation, which
occurred at
an annual rate of 0.4 percent in 1989-90, has contributed
directly to the severity of the flooding problem faced by
the
nation in the early 1990s.
As industry has expanded, factories have emitted more
and
more toxic effluents into the air and water. The number of
textile and food processing mills in rural Punjab has
grown
greatly since the mid-1970s, resulting in pollution of its
rivers
and irrigation canals. Groundwater quality throughout the
country
has also suffered from rapidly increasing use of
pesticides and
fertilizers aimed at promoting more intensive cropping and
facilitating self-sufficiency in food production.
The National Conservation Strategy Report has
documented how solid and liquid excreta are the major
source of
water pollution in the country and the cause of widespread
waterborne diseases. Because only just over half of urban
residents have access to sanitation, the remaining urban
excreta
are deposited on roadsides, into waterways, or
incorporated into
solid waste. Additionally, only three major sewage
treatment
plants exist in the country; two of them operate
intermittently.
Much of the untreated sewage goes into irrigation systems,
where
the wastewater is reused, and into streams and rivers,
which
become sewage carriers at low-flow periods. Consequently,
the
vegetables grown from such wastewater have serious
bacteriological contamination. Gastroenteritis, widely
considered
in medical circles to be the leading cause of death in
Pakistan,
is transmitted through waterborne pollutants
(see Health and Welfare
, this ch.).
Low-lying land is generally used for solid waste
disposal,
without the benefit of sanitary landfill methods. The
National
Conservation Strategy has raised concerns about industrial
toxic
wastes also being dumped in municipal disposal areas
without any
record of their location, quantity, or toxic composition.
Another
important issue is the contamination of shallow
groundwater near
urban industries that discharge wastes directly into the
ground.
Water in Karachi is so contaminated that almost all
residents
boil it before consuming it. Because sewerage and water
lines
have been laid side by side in most parts of the city,
leakage is
the main cause of contamination. High levels of lead also
have
been found in water in Islamabad and Rawalpindi.
Air pollution has also become a major problem in most
cities.
There are no controls on vehicular emissions, which
account for
90 percent of pollutants. The National Conservation
Strategy
Report claims that the average Pakistani vehicle emits
twenty-five times as much carbon monoxide, twenty times as
many
hydrocarbons, and more than three and one-half times as
much
nitrous oxide in grams per kilometer as the average
vehicle in
the United States.
Another major source of pollution, not mentioned in the
National Conservation Strategy Report, is noise.
The
hyperurbanization experienced by Pakistan since the 1960s
has
resulted in loose controls for heavy equipment operation
in
densely populated areas, as well as in crowded streets
filled
with buses, trucks, automobiles, and motorcycles, which
often
honk at each other and at the horse-drawn tongas (used for
transporting people) and the horse-drawn rehras
(used for
transporting goods).
Data as of April 1994
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