Nov 27, 2007 -Thimphu: In view of the increasing number of industries, particularly in the Pasakha industrial estate, the National Environment Commission (NEC) in consultation with the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MEA) has developed industrial emission, ambient air quality and noise standards for Bhutan.
In order to sensitize the above standards the NEC Secretariat and MEA jointly conducted a workshop with the industry owners and their senior managers in Phuentsholing on November 16.
Adoption of cleaner technologies, pollution control equipments and good environment management were some of the key issues discussed in order to realize the dream of development without destruction.
The national standards have been categorized into four divisions: ambient air quality (of residential, commercial and sensitive areas like schools and hospitals), industrial emission, work place emission (within the premises of an industry) and noise level limits (both day and night noise limit).
“The target of the Tenth five year plan is economic growth but it should not be at the cost of environment contamination and health hazards,” said deputy minister, Dasho Nado Rinchen, the head of NEC.
He further said that the old industries were given enough time to replace their old machineries but for the new upcoming industries there would be no compromise.
The press release from NEC states that these standards will play a major role in facilitating and expediting the approval of project proposals.
“By that it does not mean the standards are too high to cause commotion among the industry owners nor is it too low to undermine the purpose, making it a name sake policy,” said Nado Rinchen, adding that the factory owners can easily fulfill the standards.
He added that implementation of the standards are not restricted to Pasakha alone.
The Director General of the Department of Industry, Sangay Wangdi, said, these standards were developed after a lengthy consultation process with industries and other stake holders.
The Senior General Manager of Bhutan Ferro Alloys Ltd. C.R.K. Rao said that his company has no problem in complying with the standards, “Bhutan needs to have such standards and we will stick to that,” he said.
The standards were approved by the NEC in September during the 24th commission meeting.
Source: BhutanTimes Newspaper
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Why can we look for alternatives to these giant environment polluting industries? Why should Bhutan tread a different path from the industrialized nations? Does economic development have to be synonymous with industrialisation?