KARACHI, April 3: The Sindh environment department has decided to enforce the Environmental Impact Assessment regulations for new building projects in the city.

Speaking at a press conference in the Sindh Secretariat building, the adviser to chief minister on environment and alternative energy, Faisal Malik, said that builders of housing and commercial complexes in the city had been ignoring the legal requirement of getting their development ventures cleared by the Sindh Environmental Protection Agency which had added to the environmental problems of the city.

He said that now his department had launched a series of consultative meetings with the stakeholders of the housing sector to develop consensus on linkage between environmental assessment and other relevant planning laws and procedure.

He observed that like other metropolises Karachi was expanding rapidly due to urban development, including housing and residential estates, which entailed adverse environmental impacts aggravated by ineffective management.

However, now it was high time, he remarked, that "we start discussions on the issue with some NGOs, representatives of builders and government officials from development bodies to ensure harmonization of different sectoral actions and institutions involved in the urban development."

He said that unplanned and haphazard development ignoring environmental concerns had caused adverse effects like traffic congestions, air pollution, noise pollution and accidents and inconvenience to people.

"Therefore it is needed that the condition of EIA, which is the basic tool to perceive and arrest the adverse environmental impacts at the planning stage be enforced under the provision of the Pakistan Environmental Protection Act 1977 for all development projects, including roads, buildings, bridges, industrial areas and shopping complexes," he said.

He said his department did not want any sudden halt to development projects, but it was heading towards a system, under the legal provisions, binding the builders and other project developers and executers to submit EIA for their respective projects to SEPA, which, among other measures, would hold public hearing on it and then decide whether to issue an NOC to the parties concerned.

The secretary of the Sindh environment department, Shujaat Ali Qarni, said that SEPA had the power to examine any housing project before its launch, but it did want to create any obstacle in the process of such development and aimed at creating awareness among all the stakeholders.

"We would move gradually to achieve the target of safe environment and hazard-free construction," he added.

The DCO of Karachi, Mir Hussain Ali, said the city government was actively working for overall improvement in the city environment, waste management system, sanitation and sewerage, domestic and industrial effluents treatment. The government had already decided not to allow conversion of any land to commercial one at the cost of environment, he added.

A participant of the consultative meeting, which was held at the office of the CM's adviser on Saturday, said that the local infrastructure capacity should be examined to determine its adequacy for the needs of new population.

He said that when a housing estate actually became residential accommodation, environmental impacts were the inevitableresults of the habits of the residents and the possible pollution and health hazards associated with the provision of services such as sewerage and treatment and solid waste disposal.