Pakistan has recently been under acute economic turmoil, and now the country faces another challenge that needs to be dealt with. During a standing committee on climate change held recently, the Islamabad senate was left dazzled as it learnt that countries such as the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Saudi Arabia, Germany and Italy collectively export its waste to Pakistan.
On learning the harsh reality, the senate members were completely shocked as the list includes friendly nations, who once voiced their opinions for issues pertaining to climate change in Pakistan.
A committee member, reacting to this new challenge upfront, questioned, “Why Pakistan never objected to imported waste?” He further added how could the ministries, embassies and concerned government divisions let anything as such happen? Moreover, he asked, “What have the provincial and federal governments been doing all this while?”
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In the committee, majority senators had no idea of Pakistan serving as a waste dump ground to the entire world, especially from the advanced countries that have always supported climatic retention in the country. Laying emphasis on the streets bearing toxic waste all over, the senators asked why has Pakistan not been exporting all the waste to some other country?
Faisal Javed, the Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaaf senator said, “Imported waste Na Manzoor”, highlighting the former Prime Minister and party chief Iran Khan’s incapability of denying imported waste into the country. In the meeting, reports revealed that major proportion of imported waste had been either dumped in the sea or in the outskirts of cities.
The revelation of such an issue has come soon after the country cabinet was informed about the production of total waste by Pakistan – around 30 million tonnes of waste alongside 80,000 tonnes of bundled waste imported by the country from across the world. Such climatic exploitation has led to growing environmental issues in the country, ultimately adding to more health-related hazards.
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Amidst global economic depression, Pakistan has been battling the worst hit economic crisis with rapidly rising inflation. According to a Bloomberg report, consumer prices have soared up to 21.32%. With such economic pressure already lined up, Pakistan is now under a new challenge of growing toxic waste created mainly due to waste import.
