HYDERABAD, April 17 Speakers at a consultative workshop on “green accounting” called for institutionalising integration of environmental values into national income accounts as enshrined in the national environmental policy of 2,005.

The workshop was organised by WWF-Pakistan's Indus for All Programme at a local hotel on Monday. Dean, Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Sindh, Dr Iqbal Panhwar, former Sindh irrigation secretary Hashim Leghari, programme coordinator Nasir Panwhar and others spoke on the occasion.

Dr Panwhar said that human beings should be considered as an integral part of environment. He said that for green accounting's success, it needed to be adopted by federal, provincial and district governments.

He said that local governments should integrate green accounting into annual development plans.

He said that green accounting required two actions simultaneously at district and national levels. He underlined the need for seeking information from local people, particularly elderly people who were engaged in environment-friendly activities.

Mr Leghari said that due to lack of green accounting, the process of development had retarded and the issue had direct link to water supply. He emphasized the need to evaluate the impact of pre- and post-Mangla and Tarbela dam situation on Indus River and its delta. He said that the government should make a provision of water for the delta.

Mr Panhwar said that it had been established that welfare of human beings was linked to environment and livelihood of communities depending on natural resources was at stake due to environmental degradation.

Programme economist, Indus for all Programme, Ali Dehlavi, said that a major cause for careless mining of natural resources was lack of information among decision makers about the scale of their contribution to rural economy and national accounts.

He said that such workshops were a culmination of intensive field research to estimate monetary values of critical natural habitats in Indus eco-region.