ISLAMABAD, Oct 21: A plan to set up six environment monitoring stations in the country at a cost of Rs1 billion has been sent to Central Development Working Party (CDWP) for approval, a senior official of the Pakistan environment protection agency (Pepa) told Dawn here on Monday.

The official said the CDWP would meet soon so as to approve the plan.

He said it was agreed that the stations would be established in six cities with the total funding of Japan government.

Besides, the Japan government will also provide expertise to run the project on permanent basis, he added. The cities where these stations would be set up are: Islamabad, Rawalpindi, Karachi, Lahore, Peshawar and Quetta.

The official said the main objective to set up the stations was to monitor air and water pollution to have an exact data of environment so far not available.

“This kind of stations are being established for the first time in the country,” he claimed.

The environment monitoring stations would have labs and centres to train local experts about modern techniques of monitoring and controlling pollution.

“After monitoring air and water pollution, we will be able to take necessary measures to control pollution in the country,” he maintained.

Talking about another project being executed in collaboration with the UNDP, the official said the project had four components which were clean air, clean water, solid waste management and echo-system management.

He said the project was in progress and it would help reduce environmental pollution.

The official said in a recent survey, it was observed that rate of solid waste production in the country was very high.

The survey suggested that people should give up their habit of throwing waste material outside their houses.